Bhubaneswar, Dec. 9: The Railway Protection Force's recent drive against touts using multiple personal IDs to book train tickets has forced them to resort to playing tricks at the booking counters of Bhubaneswar railway station.

The Government Railway Police (GRP) today arrested two persons for duping passengers by promising them confirmed tickets. While one of the accused, Prasant Kumar Rout, 35, was arrested for duping Rs 2,400 from one Sunit Moharana promising him a confirmed ticket for Chennai, another accused Kalandi Pradhan, 45, impersonated himself as a Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) officer and duped Rs 2,850 from one Kalandi Pradhan assuring him of a confirmed ticket for Pune.

The police said both the accused used to stand in the queues in front of the booking counter and target passengers in urgent need of tickets. "Both of them used to collect money after convincing the passengers and later flee the spot. Dixit used to identify himself as CISF employee and often convince the victims by saying that he was supposed to visit the same destination in the same train. We have also seized a duplicate CISF identity card from Dixit. Besides, we have seized several booking forms and a number of identity proofs from the accused," said Government Railway Police station inspector in-charge Soubhagya Kumar Swain.

The police suspected involvement of an organised racket at the station. "After the railway decided to keep tabs on frauds using multiple IDs for e-tickets through the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), the touts are now appearing at the booking counters to find potential targets. Dixit confessed of duping several other passengers in same fashion," said a GRP official.

According to the official statistics, as many as 13 persons were arrested in the East Coast Railway (ECoR) jurisdiction in 2015, while this year the RPF, so far, has arrested 15 persons for using their personal IDs to book tickets and later selling those with hefty commission.

The recent such case was detected on July 16 when the RPF personnel zeroed in on a person from Jajpur district and seized 13 tickets procured by him through the IRCTC. Further investigation revealed that the accused had created 14 fake IDs to book tickets. In June, the RPF, with the help of Saheed Nagar police, had arrested a travel agent from Acharya Vihar and seized tickets worth Rs 40,000 from his possession.

Railway officials cautioned passengers not to give any money to outsiders for booking tickets. "In case of movement of suspicious men in the booking area, passengers should inform the matter to the police," said an official.