Hyderabad: Fabricated certificate manufacturing gangs are thriving in the city. In the last 18 months, Hyderabad Task Force and Cyberabad SOT teams have nabbed about 33 gangs for fabricating fake educational, job experience certificates, bank statements for US visa, driving licenses, vehicle registration cards, Aadhaar and ration cards.

The gangs which employed crude methods for producing fabricated certificates earlier, are now using sophisticated technology to create fake documents. After 19-year-old student Vishesh Agarwal was caught in a bar and restaurant with a fake driving license, police teams are concentrating on fake certificate gangs.

Gangs, which produce fake educational certificates, are still using old screen printing techniques for creating ‘watermarks’ on certificates and use computers, scanners and printers only for printing text on the watermarked paper. Similarly, fabricated land document producing gangs, fake experience certificate rackets and fake bank statement gangs exist in west and south zones.

Surprisingly, some gangs in the city are procuring empty smart cards from RTO offices to create fake vehicle registration certificates for bank loans. These gangs do not tamper with the details on the card but create new cards which state the vehicle is free of loans. Later, the gang approaches banks for taking loans. Such gangs were nabbed in the city in 2009, 2010 and 2013 by police.

West zone task force inspector L. Raja Venkat Reddy said that their teams have been focusing on such gangs. “Whenever we get credible information on these gangs we nab them. We have nabbed 13 gangs in the last six months. We are focusing on the Jubilee Hills case now in which a minor boy procured a fake driving license with false dates,” he said.