When someone offers an easy visa and a well-paid job in Singapore, Dubai, or Kuwait, it’s easy to fall for the bait. This is precisely what happened to over 150 job aspirants in Thiruvananthapuram. The Thampanoor police have been investigating the job fraud for three years. They said a group of men who operated a travel and tour company offered jobs in other countries, of course for a price, and then disappeared with over Rs.1.5 crore.
Though three of them were arrested after the case was registered in 2011, the key accused — one whom the police know as Susheel alias Samuel Alexander, and Santosh Abraham — are still at large. According to the police, the duo, along with the arrested — Seythali, Vijayan and Sunil — had operated a firm called Trivandrum Air Travels and Tours near Dharmalayam Lane. The police, who broke open the office, found over 300 passports, all collected from job aspirants. But the Rs.1.5 crore that they collected and the men had disappeared.
“We know nothing about Susheel. We recently got a call from the Gulf saying that his real name is Samuel Alexander. The mobile number that he used was last traced to Aluva, in 2011. That is about all. About Santosh, we know his residence in Changanassery. Nothing else,” a police officer said. Lookout notices have been issued, asking the public to call 94979 90009, 94979 87013 or 94979 60264 if they have information on the duo.
The continuing mystery
Twenty days after retired deputy tahsildar Shailaja and her husband, Mohan Kumar, were found covered in blood in their house at Pullayil, near Kilimanoor, with Shailaja’s injuries later turning fatal, the police are yet to find out what actually happened in the house between 9.30 a.m. and 11.30 a.m. on October 9.
While Shailaja died on the way to the hospital, Mohan Kumar is still under treatment and yet to recover fully to tell the police what really happened. The police, after a couple of weeks, found that gold and cash were missing from the house, pointing towards the possibility of murder for gain. With the couple operating a mini gold loan business from home, investigations are progressing in that angle. People who did business with them are being questioned. The only suspect so far is one such person who allegedly disappeared soon after he was summoned to the police station to record his statement about his transactions with the couple.
According to R. Prathapan Nair, Deputy Superintendent of Police (Attingal), the man is just a suspect with no concrete evidence to prove his involvement in the murder. “The investigation is progressing,” is all that the police say.
