Crime Branch nabs 60-year-old fraudster after 23 years of duping educated youth with fake job offers abroad
Bhubaneswar: In a dramatic development nearly 23 years after his first known offence, the Odisha Crime Branch on Friday arrested Bishnu Prasad Pattanaik, a Cambodia-based NRI, from his residence in Begunia, Khurda district. The 60-year-old accused allegedly lured highly qualified job aspirants with false promises of overseas employment in top international firms, reported timesofindia.indiatimes.com.
Pattanaik had been evading authorities since 2012, using fake identities, forged documents, and even foreign passports to run his decades-long job fraud racket.
The Crime Branch team, led by Inspector Raj Kishore Behera, tracked Pattanaik after receiving intelligence about his presence in Odisha. Despite living in Cambodia since 2012, he had quietly returned home, evading a Look Out Circular that expired in 2020 by avoiding air travel altogether.
Officials revealed that five cases of fraud have been registered against him in Rayagada district alone, the earliest dating back to 2002 at the Bisam Katak police station. Investigators believe there may be more cases in other Indian states like Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.
In two 2018 cases registered at Gunupur police station, Pattanaik allegedly defrauded an aeronautical engineer of ₹90 lakh and another electronics and instrumentation engineer of ₹15 lakh. He took the victims to Cambodia and Thailand under the guise of arranging interviews with international airlines in London, Germany, and Thailand.
Using his NRI status and impersonating professionals like doctors and engineers, Pattanaik forged appointment letters from reputed companies to scam unsuspecting youth.
“Since 2012, he had been residing in Cambodia to escape arrest. Our investigation reveals he used persuasive communication, fake professional identities, and even ran an alleged IT-cum-job consultancy firm in Cambodia,” said DG (Crime Branch) Vinaytosh Mishra.
He also reportedly held two passports—one of which was forged—adding to the list of criminal charges against him. The Crime Branch has urged additional victims to come forward, as their testimonies could strengthen the case.