CHENNAI: Government Railway Police (GRP) on Tuesday arrested a man who posed as a Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE) and collected money from unassuming passengers for the past one year by issuing fake tickets.
The arrested person was identified as B Jithendra of Kodungaiyur. He was booked under IPC sections 420 (cheating), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating) and 471 (fraudulently duplicating documents), railway police said.
According to an official with GRP, they were receiving complaints from passengers about being duped by a man who had issued them 'tickets', which were eventually found to be fake when being checked by the actual ticket examiners.
"We set up checks at several railway stations in the city. We found that a man dressed up as a TTE was standing near the ticket counters with a notepad and a seal. He was talking with the passengers and collecting money," said a senior railway police officer. On enquiring him, police found that he was a fake after which he was arrested and remanded to judicial custody.
Police investigations revealed that Jithendra lost his job two years ago and has been conning people for money. He would dress up in full whites and station himself at Egmore, Tambaram, Central, Perambur and Velachery railway station. With an empty notepad Jithendra would write the names of the passengers with their age and place a fake seal on it. He would later sign the paper and give it to the passengers, who believed them to be authentic documents.