The students had applied for study visas through Education Migration Services in Jalandhar, which had charged each student more than Rs 16 lakh. The fraud came to light when the students applied for permanent residency in Canada, and the documents came under scrutiny. More than 700 Indian students in Canada face deportation after the Canadian Border Security Agency (CBSA) discovered that their ‘admission offer letters’ to educational institutions were fakes. These students applied for study visas through an Education Migration Services company based in Jalandhar. The company had charged each student more than Rs 16 lakh for all expenses, including admission fees to Humber College, a prestigious Canadian institution, but excluding airfare and security deposits. The fraud was discovered when these students applied for permanent residency in Canada and their admission offer letters were examined. CBSA examined the documents used to issue visas to students and discovered that the admission offer letters were fake. According to experts, such a large-scale fraud was caused by a large number of applicants to Canada, and it is the first of its kind to come to light in Canada.

Details of the Fraud
The majority of these students had already completed their studies, obtained work permits, and gained work experience. They only got into trouble when they applied for permanent residency. Multiple factors are involved in such frauds, ranging from obtaining forged offer letters from colleges to providing forged fee payment receipts to students seeking visas. In this case, most of the students were given offer letters from colleges where they did not eventually study after arriving in Canada. They were either transferred to other colleges or told to wait until the next semester, which was not the semester indicated in the documents when they applied for visas. Several students claimed that their fees were returned to them by the agent, allowing them to enrol in other colleges but failing to notify the Canadian government. Returning the fee (by the agent) made the agent less suspicious.