Couple uses AI tools to create fake local railway pass; detained after ticket checker detects fraud
Thane, Nov 27 (PTI): Police have detained a woman sales manager of a private bank and her engineer husband for allegedly creating a fake season pass for local railway travel in the Mumbai suburban network using Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools, officials said on Thursday.
The couple's fraud came to light on November 26 when a ticket checker was examining the tickets in an AC local train going to Dadar in Mumbai from Kalyan in Thane, in which the woman was travelling, they said.
She was caught when the train was between Kalyan and Dombivli stations, they said.
Ticket checker Vishal Tukaram Navle was inspecting tickets in the AC local train. When he asked the woman, Gudiya Omkar Sharma (28), to show her ticket, she told him that she had a season pass, but failed to open it through the railway's official Unreserved Ticketing System (UTS) mobile app. She opened a link on the Google Chrome browser to show the pass. The QR code section was also non-functional, the police said.
The ticket checker grew suspicious, and in order to verify the pass' serial number, he contacted the Central Railway helpline, and the authorities told him that the pass expired in February this year. It also came to light that the pass was registered under a male name - Omkar Sharma - who is her husband, they said.
After the fraud was detected, the woman and her 30-year-old husband were detained. During his questioning, Omkar confessed to using his coding knowledge to indulge in this sophisticated forgery. He said he used AI tools to generate a counterfeit UTS pass, according to the police.
After that, the Kalyan railway police registered a case against them under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) sections 318 (4) (cheating), 336(2) (forgery), 336 (3), 340 (forged document or electronic record and using it as genuine), and 3(5) (common intention).
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Kulkarni became victim of BJP conspiracy as he grew politically in North Karnataka: Shivakumar
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Bengaluru (PTI): Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar claimed on Friday that Congress MLA Vinay Kulkarni, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in a murder case, has become a victim of a BJP conspiracy because he was growing politically in the north Karnataka region.
Stating that he has faith in Kulkarni and believes he has done nothing wrong, he said the former minister will fight the case legally by filing an appeal.
A Bengaluru court on Friday sentenced Kulkarni and fifteen others to life imprisonment in the BJP leader Yogeshgouda Goudar murder case.
On Wednesday, Santhosh Gajanan Bhat, Judge of the Special Court for cases involving elected representatives, convicted Kulkarni and others under various IPC sections, including criminal conspiracy and murder.
“I respect the court. But there was a big conspiracy in this case. When the police were about to file a B-report, the CBI was given the case to harass him (Kulkarni). Vinay Kulkarni has become a victim of a BJP conspiracy as he was growing politically in north Karnataka,” Shivakumar said.
Speaking to reporters in New Delhi, he said Kulkarni has several legal options.
“I have spoken to his family. He swore on God and told me that he had not done anything wrong. I still have faith in him. I feel that he has not done anything wrong. He has an opportunity to file an appeal,” he said, adding that he stands with Kulkarni’s family and supporters and believes he will get justice.
The case pertains to the killing of Goudar, a BJP zilla panchayat member, in Dharwad on June 15, 2016. Kulkarni was a minister at the time. Hired assailants allegedly attacked and hacked Goudar to death in his gym in Saptapur, Dharwad.
Following demands from Goudar’s family and others, the then-BJP government transferred the case to the CBI in 2019.
Veteran BJP leader and former Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa, under whose tenure the case was handed over to the CBI, told reporters in Chikkamagaluru, “I said what I needed to say when the crime happened, and what I said—that the guilty should be punished and justice should be served—has proven true.”
Speaking to reporters in Bengaluru, BJP leader and MLC C T Ravi, reacting to the court order, said, “Justice delayed, but not denied.”
