The Ghaziabad police are also verifying the role of an RPO employee in the racket.

The police received a tip-off that a travel agent in Delhi was on the look out for a customer who could buy blank original passports. A decoy customer struck a deal with one of the suspects Ashok Jatana. According to the police, a customer could get a passport for Rs 30,000. A trap was laid and Jatana was apprehended. Four blank passports were seized from his possession.

A case has been registered at the R.K. Puram police station. On sustained interrogation, Jatana told the police that he had been working with Riyaz Khan who operated as a tout at the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad and the Bhikaji Cama Place office in the Capital. During the investigation, the police received another tip-off that Khan, who changed cars frequently, was now using a white Ambassador car bearing the number DL-3CE-9744.

This vehicle was intercepted near Regional Passport Office, Bhikaji Cama Place and Khan was arrested. Two blank passports were seized from his possession. Khan later confessed that he, along with associates Mujib Rehman and Shyam Mohan, had stolen a wooden box containing blank original passports from the RPO, Ghaziabad. He also reporteldy told the police that he had planned the theft with the connivance of an RPO employee.

The employee concerned apparently provided Khan with the sketch of the key of the store-room using which he was able to make a duplicate key.

But Khan, Rehman and Mohan were apparently unable to open the store room. They later took the help of a locksmith to get into the store-room.

The police have seized 962 stolen passports and Rs 27,000 in cash from Khan's Malviya Nagar house. Rehman was apprehended near the ITO crossing and four blank original passports were found on his person.

DCP (special cell) Ashok Chand told Express Newsline, ``Had this seizure not been made, the stolen passports would have reached criminal elements trying to get away from the country. The racketeers might have duped innocent job-seekers by providing them with forged original passports.'' Special Cell sources disclosed that more arrests are anticipated in the next few days.