Patna, July 25: The fake website of Patna High Court, which is said to have duped as many as 175 people by promising them jobs, was made somewhere in south Patna.

A day after the police disclosed about the fake court website (www.highcourtpatna.co.in), they have said it was prepared in the state capital itself.

“The Internet Protocol (IP) address is being checked and the police are close to exposing the gang or the individual who created this (fake website) and duped so many people. Investigations are on in this connection,” a senior police officer told The Telegraph, adding that the police are not willing to disclose more than this at the moment. With the fake website still operational, the police said a request in this regard has been sent to Google International.

“It might take some days, maybe a fortnight, before the website can be blocked. A request has been sent to Google for the same,” the officer said.

The officer added that the police have so far received just complaint from Praveen Singh, a resident of Saidpur area in the state capital. Singh said he was duped of Rs 7,000 by one Baidyanath Sahni, claiming to be the driver of a high court judge.

“The FIR was lodged at Kotwali police station on July 16, a day after Sahni asked him to join as a Group D employee. The results for the so-called successful candidates for the job offer have been put on the fake website and the list has got the names and details of all of them. There are no complaints yet and it can be assumed that even these names are fake. On the contrary, the name of Praveen Singh does not figure in the list. Even the list needs to be verified,” a police officer said.

Praveen was given a joining letter on a white paper without any stamp or signature. The letter stated his serial number to be 933 and the roll number as 133. The result list on the website does not have a serial number or roll number similar to Praveen’s.

After Praveen went to the high court premises on the given date of his joining, an official told him there was no such vacancy.

“The man was perplexed after the official told him that vacancy of no such job was advertised on the court website. After this, the man lodged an FIR with Kotwali police station,” the police officer said.

The original website of the Patna High court is www.patnahighcourt.bih.nic.in.