Mumbai: Marathi film producer Swapna Patker has been arrested by the Mumbai Police for obtaining a fake PhD degree and using it to secure a job as a psychologist at a Bandra hospital.
The 39-year-old is best known for producing the film Balkadu in 2015, which is a biopic of Shiv Sena founder Balasaheb Thackeray.
The fraud came to light when 51-year-old social worker Gurdeep Kaur Singh lodged a police complaint against her after he received a parcel in April with documents related to Patker’s fake degree from an anonymous person.
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According to the documents, the PhD certificate of Patker, purportedly issued by the Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj University in Kanpur, in 2009 was actually fake.
It also mentioned that she got herself a job as an honorary consultant at a renowned hospital in Bandra and treated people suffering from mental health issues.
An FIR was then registered against her at the Bandra police station on May 26, and she has now been arrested under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), including 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating), 467 (forgery) and 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating).