NEW YORK: An Indian citizen, who was the CEO of two information technology companies in the US, has been arrested in connection with a multi-year visa-fraud scheme involving forged and fraudulent documents to get visas such as H1B for over 200 foreign workers.

Pradyumna Kumar Samal, 49, was taken into custody as he arrived from an international flight at Seattle airport.

The criminal complaint describing the visa-fraud scheme was filed under seal in April 2018, soon after Samal fled the United States while the investigation was ongoing. He remained out of the country until this week when he was arrested by law enforcement.

The criminal complaint describes how two companies incorporated by Samal in 2010 and 2011 in Washington state engaged in a scheme sometimes referred to as a “bench-and-switch” scheme, to exploit foreign-national workers, compete unlawfully in the market, and defraud the US government.

According to the investigation that began in 2015, Samal served as the chief executive officer of ‘Azimetry’ in Bellevue, near Seattle. Both companies were in the business of providing information-technology workers, such as software development engineers, to major corporate clients.

The complaint alleges that Samal submitted, and directed his employees to submit, forged and false application materials to the United States government, making it appear as if two corporate clients already had agreed to use several foreign-national employees named in the applications. However, neither client had agreed to do so.

The forged documents included forged letters and fraudulent statements of work, which appeared as if they had been signed by senior executives at the two clients. After the US Citizenship and Immigration Services relied on the false representations and approved the work visa applications, Samal’s companies “benched” the foreign nationals, leaving those foreign nationals unpaid unless they were able to place those employees at actual end clients.

Nearly 200 workers may have been brought in under the phony applications. The employees were forced to pay Samal’s companies a partially-refundable “security deposit” of as much as $5,000 for the visa filings, regardless of whether they were assigned to any projects that provided them with income.

Visa Fraud is punishable by up to ten years in prison and a USD 250,000 fine.

Hyderabad: Amid strong indications of early elections in Telangana, the ruling TRS is all set to hold a massive show of strength here on Sunday.Billed as the mother of all rallies, it will be preceded by a meeting of the state cabinet, which is likely to take a decision on the early polls.

Leaders of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) said Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao will take “key decisions” at the cabinet meeting and announce them at the public meeting.The cabinet may pass a resolution to dissolve the Assembly and recommend this to Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan. If the Election Commission agrees, the polls may be held in December along with the elections in three other states.

For last few weeks, RAO had been dropping hints of assembly elections being advanced. He has already declared that the party will announce the candidates in September.KCR, as Rao is popularly known, is keen to advance the assembly polls by six months to avoid simultaneous elections to the Assembly and the Parliament.

His two meetings with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in August further added to the speculation.KCR’s son and cabinet minister K.T. Rama Rao said the Chief Minister would take a final decision on early polls. Rama Rao, who is number two in the party and the government, is confident of TRS retaining power whenever the elections are held as the party enjoys full support of the people.

Titled “Pragati Nivedana”, the meeting to be held at Kongara Kalan at Ibrahimpatnam on the city outskirts is expected to attract 25 lakh people. Rama Rao claims that this will be the biggest political rally in the country.According to him, TRS has 47 lakh members and if half of them turn up, the meet would be a huge success. TRS leaders are mobilising people for the meet from across the state.

Arrangements were in full swing for the meeting amid allegations by the Congress and other opposition parties that TRS was misusing official machinery. They asked TRS to explain the source of funds for the event.The massive mobilisation of people is expected to hit the traffic on Outer Ring Road (ORR) as thousands of vehicles will be heading towards the venue from different entry points along ORR. Rama Rao has suggested to people not attending the meeting to stay indoors.

Hyderabad High Court, while rejecting a petition to bar the meet, directed the organisers to ensure that inconvenience to public is minimised.TRS has turned the city and outskirts pink by putting up billboards, flags and posters.

Going by the speculations doing rounds in the media circles, Telangana Rashtra Samithi president and chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao might go in for dissolution of the state assembly on September 2 itself, on the same day when his party is holding a massive public meeting at Kongara Kalan on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

The speculations were triggered from an official communication from the Chief Minister’s Office on Friday evening that the state cabinet would meet at 2 pm on September 2, a couple of hours before the commencement of the mega public meeting.

The cabinet is expected to take a decision on dissolution of the assembly, apart from other important policy decisions.

“From the cabinet meeting, KCR and his ministers straightaway come to the public meeting, where he will announce in public about his decision to dissolve the assembly and go for early polls. He will get their approval in the form of cheers and then announce a number of decisions taken for the welfare and development of the state at the meeting,” a source said.

Soon after the public meeting, KCR will return to Hyderabad and rush to Raj Bhavan to submit the cabinet decision to dissolve the Telangana assembly to Governor E S L Narasimhan.

He will approve the same and send it to the Election Commission the following day, sources added.