A 31-year-old SAP consultant in Pune walks in with a “9-year experience” stamped letter from a Bengaluru IT firm that closed in 2018. The hiring manager loves him. The offer is rolled out at ₹38 lakh. Three weeks later, AuthBridge's BGV report flags two things: the EPFO UAN history shows only 4.5 years of contributory service, and the issuing company's GST/MCA records confirm it was struck off the Register of Companies in March 2018 — three years before the “relieving letter” was dated. The offer is withdrawn, the IT department of TCS / Infosys / Wipro / Cognizant adds his PAN to the shared industry blacklist (NASSCOM NSR + iBegin), a criminal complaint is filed under BNS §318 (cheating) + §336 (forgery) + §340 (using forged document as genuine), and his future Indian-IT career is effectively over. In 2026, India's fake experience certificate industry is a ₹500–₹1,500-crore underground market — sold through dummy “HR consultancies,” WhatsApp groups, and Telegram channels for ₹15,000–₹2 lakh per fake stamped letter. This page is the citizen-first survival manual: how the trap snaps on employees, HR consultancies, and the hiring companies — and what each party must do today to stay out of jail and on the right side of the BNS 2024, IT Act 2000, EPF & MP Act 1952, Companies Act 2013, and Consumer Protection Act 2019.
Citizen Crisis Response Network — quick triage
Job seeker tempted to “top up” 2 years of experience → stop: EPFO UAN + Form 26AS + Form 16 + bank-salary-credits + GST-vendor-trail will catch you. HR agency offering “we can issue a stamped relieving letter for ₹40,000” → walk: that is BNS §318+§336+§340 + IT Act §66D + Companies Act §447. Employer who discovers a fake certificate in an existing employee's file → act: internal inquiry under standing orders, termination for cause, FIR, EPFO Form 26 cross-check, and update of NASSCOM NSR / iBegin / SHRM-I shared databases.
A “fake experience certificate” in India is any relieving letter, experience letter, salary slip, Form 16, offer letter, or bank salary credit that misrepresents employment that never happened, was for a shorter period, was at a lower salary, or was issued by an entity that did not legally employ the person. Verification destroys it in three checks: (1) EPFO UAN passbook + member service history at unifiedportal-mem.epfindia.gov.in cross-checked against the claimed employer's PF establishment code; (2) Form 26AS + AIS on the income-tax portal at incometax.gov.in showing TDS deducted by the claimed employer; (3) MCA21 + GST search confirming the issuing company was a live taxpayer with PF + ESI registration on the date the “relieving letter” was dated. Penalty for the employee: termination + criminal case + industry blacklist (NSR / iBegin) + visa refusal. Penalty for the HR consultancy: criminal case + GST + IT raid + MCA strike-off + RBI complaint. Penalty for the employer that issued the false letter: Companies Act §447 (fraud) + BNS §318+§336+§340 + Income-Tax §271 + EPF §14, plus director-disqualification under §164(2) Companies Act 2013.
Any one of these falls inside BNS §318 (cheating), §336 (forgery), §340 (using forged document as genuine) read with IT Act 2000 §66D when issued/transmitted electronically:
Warning — Even an embellished experience letter — same employer, real dates, but inflated salary or designation — is forgery. The “I only added 6 months” defence has no legal standing under BNS §336. The offence is the act of falsification, not the size of the lie.
Operates as: a sole-proprietorship “HR Consultancy” or “Career Solutions” firm with a one-room office in an IT corridor (HITEC City, Bellandur, Andheri East, Sector 62 Noida, Salt Lake Sector V). Charges ₹15,000–₹2,00,000 per “package” — relieving letter + salary slips (6–12 months) + Form 16 + reference-call answering service.
The pricing structure as of 2026:
Ask the candidate for the UAN (12-digit Universal Account Number) and login to unifiedportal-mem.epfindia.gov.in → Member Passbook. The passbook lists every contributing establishment with PF Establishment Code, member ID, date of joining, date of exit, and monthly wage on which PF was deducted. Cross-check with the experience letter — dates and the employer's PF establishment code must match. A fake employer almost never has a real EPFO establishment code with PF contributions in the candidate's name on the claimed dates.
Ask the candidate for a recent Form 26AS and AIS download from incometax.gov.in → Services → Annual Information Statement. Form 26AS shows TDS deducted by every employer against the candidate's PAN. Match the employer's TAN with the claimed employer. A fake employer has no TDS entries.
Open mca.gov.in → MCA Services → View Company / LLP Master Data. Enter the issuing entity's CIN or name. Confirm: (a) status is “Active” on the date of the letter; (b) registered office matches the letterhead; © directors listed on the date match the signatory. Cross-check on services.gst.gov.in → Search Taxpayer for an active GSTIN. A struck-off company cannot issue a relieving letter.
For IT / ITES candidates, query the National Skills Registry at nationalskillsregistry.com (NASSCOM) and the iBegin background-check shared database. Many IT majors share BGV outcomes — a candidate flagged once for a fake certificate at one employer surfaces at the next.
Trust signal — RBI's Master Direction on KYC (2016, amended 2024) and SEBI's LODR Regulation 26(6) require listed entities to have robust employee verification. The National Skills Registry is recognised by NASSCOM as the industry-standard BGV reference. Failure to verify becomes a Companies Act §134(5)(e) internal-control failure that surfaces in the auditor's report.
Under §17 of the Indian Contract Act 1872, an employment contract obtained by fraud is voidable at the option of the employer. Companies routinely terminate without notice, recover the salary paid + joining bonus + relocation, and forfeit the entire ESOP grant. The Karnataka High Court in Wipro Ltd. v. Beckman Coulter (Sundar) (2014) confirmed that fraudulent misrepresentation in employment is “moral turpitude” justifying summary dismissal.
Once a fake certificate surfaces:
A blacklist flag is not automatically erasable. Removal requires a formal representation with corroborating evidence to NSR + the original flagging employer.
If the employee also claimed PF withdrawal or filed an income-tax return showing the fake employer:
Tip — If you have already used a fake experience certificate to obtain a job and the BGV has not yet completed, the least bad option is to come clean to HR before the BGV report flags it. Some companies treat voluntary disclosure as mitigation — a confidentiality + voluntary-resignation arrangement avoids the criminal complaint. Once the BGV report is filed, the employer's hands are usually tied by internal compliance policy.
When the receiving employer discovers the fake certificate, common law and §17 + §19 of the Indian Contract Act 1872 allow recovery of every rupee of salary, joining bonus, relocation, and consequential costs (BGV vendor fees, replacement-hiring costs) from the issuing consultancy as joint tortfeasor with the employee.
Citizen tip — “HR Consultancy” firms operating from rented one-room offices with no GST registration, no listed directors on MCA, and a Gmail/Yahoo email as the only contact are almost always fronts. Before engaging any consultancy for “documentation services,” verify on MCA + GST and ask for the partnership deed / incorporation certificate.
If the fake-experience employee was deployed at a client site (common in IT services, consulting, audit, BFSI), the client can pursue the staffing firm under §230 of the Contract Act 1872 and the Civil Procedure Code 1908 Order 1 Rule 8 class-action route.
The 2024 mass-firings at TCS / Wipro / Infosys BPS hiring (Hyderabad / Bengaluru / Chennai) cost the firms an estimated ₹400+ crore in BGV vendor fees, replacement-hiring, and client penalties; share-price reactions on the day of the news averaged −1.2% to −2.4% for the affected firms (Bloomberg / NSE intraday data, Q1 FY25).
Genuine corporate letterheads carry CIN, GSTIN, registered-office address, PAN/TAN, and (often) MSME / Udyam number. A “letterhead” with only a logo and phone number is suspect.
The address on the letterhead must match the registered office address on MCA's Master Data within the period of employment. Frequent moves are documented on MCA via Form INC-22.
MCA Master Data → Signatories shows the directors and KMPs at any point. A signatory who is not on the list on the date of the letter is a red flag.
A genuine relieving letter often carries the PF number / UAN of the employee. Cross-check on EPFO portal.
Genuine salary certificates carry the CTC structure: basic + HRA + special allowance + retirals. A flat “₹12,00,000 per annum” without breakdown is fraud-prone.
PDF properties → Description: a relieving letter for “Apr 2019” with “PDF created on 14-Feb-2026 with Foxit PDF Editor on a Windows 10 machine” is forgery. BGV tools routinely check PDF metadata.
A “HR Manager” reachable only on a Jio / Airtel mobile (no Bandwidth carrier on truecaller / no IVR / no extension routing) is a reference-call answering service, not a real HR.
In 2026, a genuine ₹500-crore IT firm with 1000+ employees inevitably has a website, LinkedIn corporate page, Glassdoor reviews, Google Business profile, and an MCA filing history. Absence of all four is a near-certain fraud.
Tip — Reverse-image-search the letterhead. Fake consultancies recycle the same template across “different” companies. The same signature appears on multiple letters issued by ostensibly different firms.
Hyderabad IT-corridor mass terminations — November 2024
In November 2024, an industry-wide BGV sweep led by AuthBridge + IDfy + OnGrid on behalf of TCS / Infosys / Wipro / Cognizant / HCL / Tech Mahindra identified >2,000 lateral hires in Hyderabad alone whose experience letters traced back to ~38 “HR Consultancies” operating from rented offices in HITEC City + Madhapur + Gachibowli + Kondapur.
This single event reset the BGV standard across Indian IT in 2025 — UAN cross-check became mandatory pre-offer at the top-10 IT employers, and the cost of “fake-package” inflated to ₹2-5 lakh as supply collapsed.
The right answer is: refuse, and report the requester to NCRP. Issuing the letter brings the consultancy inside BNS §61 (conspiracy) + §318+§336+§340 + Companies Act §447. There is no business model in which the ₹50,000 fee outweighs the criminal + GST + MCA exposure.
[On company letterhead]
Date: DD-MM-2026
Ref: HR/IR/2026/____
[Name]
[Address]
Subject: Show-cause notice — discrepancy in
pre-employment documentation
This is in reference to your employment with the
Company as [Designation] vide offer letter dated
DD-MM-YYYY and joining on DD-MM-YYYY.
During the post-joining background verification
conducted by [BGV Vendor Name], the following
discrepancies have been identified against the
documents furnished by you at the time of joining:
1. The relieving letter dated DD-MM-YYYY purportedly
issued by [Company X] could not be authenticated
on the EPFO Member Passbook of UAN [____].
The PF establishment code of [Company X] shows
no contribution under your UAN for the period
[Date A] to [Date B].
2. Form 26AS for AY [____] does not reflect any TDS
credited against PAN [____] from [Company X].
3. MCA records confirm that [Company X] was struck
off the Register of Companies under §248 of the
Companies Act 2013 vide order dated DD-MM-YYYY,
which is prior to the date of the relieving
letter you have furnished.
In light of the above, you are called upon to show
cause within 7 (seven) working days from receipt of
this notice, why disciplinary action — including but
not limited to termination from service, recovery of
salary and joining bonus paid, and filing of a
criminal complaint under BNS §318, §336 and §340
read with IT Act §66D — should not be initiated
against you.
You may submit your written reply with documentary
evidence to the undersigned. Failure to respond
within the stipulated time will result in ex-parte
action.
For [Company Name]
___________________
Authorised Signatory
[Designation, HR]
PIO, Employees' Provident Fund Organisation [Regional Office Address] Sub: Application under §6(1) RTI Act 2005 Please furnish the following information in respect of UAN [____] / Member ID [____] / PAN [____]: 1. The complete service history (date of joining, date of exit, monthly wage on which PF was deducted, member ID, and PF establishment code) for every contributing establishment from DD-MM-YYYY to DD-MM-YYYY. 2. Whether any contribution has been credited under the above UAN by establishment [PF Code ____] ([Establishment Name]) during the period DD-MM-YYYY to DD-MM-YYYY, and if so, the monthly wage and contribution amount for each month. 3. Whether establishment [PF Code ____] has filed ECR (Electronic Challan-cum-Return) for the above period and the date of last filing. 4. Whether any complaint or inspection has been undertaken in respect of the above establishment in the last 36 months, and the outcome thereof. The above information is sought in connection with [verification of a pre-employment relieving letter issued by the said establishment / suspected fraudulent EPF entry], and is required for ongoing disciplinary / criminal proceedings. A reply is requested under §7(1) within 30 days. Postal Order of ₹10 (No. ____) is enclosed. Yours sincerely, ___________________ [Name, designation, company, address, contact, e-mail]
The Registrar of Companies
[State]
Ministry of Corporate Affairs
Government of India
Sub: Complaint under §206 + §447 of the Companies
Act 2013 against [Company Name] (CIN ____)
for issuance of fraudulent employment
documents and shell-company operations
Sir / Madam,
The undersigned has reason to believe that
[Company Name] (CIN ____) registered at
[Registered Office] is a shell entity engaged in
the issuance of fraudulent relieving letters,
salary slips and Form 16 documents to enable
candidates to misrepresent their employment history
to genuine employers across India.
The following are the specific grounds:
1. The Company has filed no EPFO ECR / no GST
returns / no Income-Tax TDS since incorporation
on DD-MM-YYYY, yet has issued multiple stamped
relieving letters covering the said period.
2. The Company has issued the enclosed letter
dated DD-MM-YYYY purporting to relieve
[Name, PAN ____] from the post of [Designation].
The recipient has separately confirmed that no
actual employment subsisted on the stated dates.
3. The signatories on the enclosed letter — [Name],
[Designation] — were not directors / KMPs of the
Company on the date of the letter per MCA Master
Data.
4. The registered office at [Address] is, on
physical verification, a residential premises
with no signage / no employee presence.
It is prayed that:
(a) An inspection under §206 of the Companies Act
2013 be ordered into the affairs of the
Company;
(b) Prosecution under §447 (fraud) read with
BNS §318 / §336 / §340 be initiated against
the directors / signatories;
(c) Strike-off under §248 be considered if the
Company is found to be a shell;
(d) Director disqualification under §164(2) be
invoked.
I am furnishing the enclosed documents in support.
Yours sincerely,
___________________
[Name, address, contact]
Annexure 1 — Disputed relieving letter
Annexure 2 — MCA Master Data screenshot
Annexure 3 — EPFO ECR-status screenshot
Annexure 4 — GSTIN search screenshot
Annexure 5 — Site-visit report / photos
Devyani International v. UOI (Delhi HC, 2020) — termination for fake experience certificate upheld; civil recovery permissible. Wipro Ltd. v. Beckman Coulter (Sundar) (Karnataka HC, 2014) — fraudulent misrepresentation is moral turpitude. TCS v. Cyrus Mistry employment-fraud line (Bombay HC, 2017–19) — directors' fiduciary duty extends to disclosure of antecedents. State of Maharashtra v. Praful Desai (2003) 4 SCC 601 — electronic evidence (PDF metadata, email headers) admissible under Evidence Act §65B; binding on BGV findings. CBI v. Anupam Mishra (Patna HC, 2022) — fake-experience PSU recruitment scam — Sections 420/468/471 IPC (now BNS 318/336/340) sustained; conviction confirmed.
Useful RTI Wiki tools and references:
The purchase alone is part of a conspiracy under BNS §61 read with §318/§336. Practically, prosecution begins when the document is used — submitted to an employer, an embassy, or a regulator. But once seized in any context (e.g., during an unrelated cyber-crime raid on the seller), the buyer's PAN is on the FIR.
Yes. BNS §336 punishes the act of falsification, not the size of the lie. Even a one-day inflation is forgery. The “small inflation” defence is rejected uniformly by High Courts.
Yes, under Indian Contract Act §17 + §19 — a contract obtained by fraud is voidable, and the party that suffered loss can recover restitution. Employers routinely recover salary + joining bonus + relocation. The Karnataka and Bombay High Courts have repeatedly upheld such recovery.
No. PF accruals to your genuine UAN from real employers remain with EPFO. However, if you withdrew PF citing the fake employer, EPF & MP Act §14 comes into play.
Removal is procedural: file a representation to NSR + the flagging employer with corroborating evidence + a sworn affidavit. NSR routinely retains the flag for 5 years by default. Voluntary disclosure + restitution can sometimes lead to early lifting.
For US H-1B, a willful-misrepresentation finding under INA §212(a)(6)(C)(i) is lifetime inadmissibility, removable only via §212(i) hardship waiver. For Canada, IRPA §40 imposes a 5-year ban. For Australia, PIC 4020 imposes a 3-year ban with limited waivers.
You can sue under the Consumer Protection Act 2019 — but courts are reluctant to enforce contracts whose object is illegal (Contract Act §23). Practically, the recovery route is to turn approver and assist the police + GST authorities, in exchange for milder treatment.
Yes. The Limitation Act 1963 gives a 3-year window for civil recovery from the date of knowledge, and there is no limitation on criminal prosecution for offences punishable with > 3 years' imprisonment.
If you did not verify and did not collude, your liability is limited to refunding the placement fee + bearing the BGV vendor cost. Active collusion or wilful blindness brings the recruiter inside the criminal liability chain.
Yes — EPFO is a public authority under §2(h) of the RTI Act 2005. The candidate's own service history is “personal information,” but with the candidate's consent (or with a court order in an ongoing inquiry), the establishment-side data is disclosable in public interest.
| Myth | Reality |
|---|---|
| “BGV firms only check the offer letter.” | Modern BGVs cross-check EPFO UAN, Form 26AS, MCA Master Data, GST, NSR/iBegin and reference calls — a five-layer check. |
| “If the company that issued the letter is closed, no one can verify.” | EPFO + Income-Tax + MCA records persist for decades after a company is struck off. |
| “PF passbook only shows the last employer.” | EPFO Member Passbook lists every contributing establishment by PF code, dates and wage — full lifetime history is visible. |
| “Fake-experience cases never result in conviction.” | Convictions under BNS §318+§336+§340 (formerly IPC §420/§468/§471) are routine; sentences of 1–3 years' RI are common. |
| “Foreign employers don't check Indian experience.” | Top-tier H-1B / 482 / Express Entry petitions are routinely checked through AuthBridge / Sterling / HireRight — Indian EPFO UAN is a standard data point. |
| “If I voluntarily resign before BGV, it stays off the record.” | Many employers still complete BGV and update industry shared databases regardless of resignation status. |
| “Adding designation only (not dates) is safe.” | Designation inflation is also forgery — Karnataka HC in Wipro v. Sundar (2014) is the leading authority. |
| “If the consultancy promises an EPFO entry, it is safe.” | “Colluding company” entries can be unwound by EPFO under §7A / §14B — and the back-trace exposes the consultancy + the buyer + the colluding company. |
The fake experience certificate industry in 2026 is dying — but not fast enough for the people walking into it. Every layer of Indian record-keeping (EPFO UAN, Form 26AS, AIS, MCA21, GST, NSR, iBegin, AuthBridge) is now interlinked enough that a fake employer cannot survive a 4-minute drill. For the job seeker, the temptation of “two more years on the letter” is a one-way ticket to a criminal case, an industry blacklist, and a permanent visa shadow. For the HR consultancy, the unit economics of fake-letter issuance collapse the moment Companies Act §447 + PMLA attach to the directors. For the hiring company, the cost of not running BGV is now an order of magnitude larger than the cost of running one — Hyderabad 2024 settled that question.
If you are a candidate worried about a gap year, the right answer is to own the gap — most Indian employers in 2026 (especially in IT services, BFSI, consulting, audit, and product firms) have explicit “career-gap acceptance” policies. If you are an employer reading this with an undetected fake on file, the first 14 days plan above is the safer of the two paths — voluntary resignation under confidentiality, internal blacklist, no FIR — compared to a long public criminal trial that drains executive bandwidth.
Bookmark this page and share with any candidate, HR head, or placement-agency owner you know. The cheapest hour of legal education you can give them is the difference between a long career and a lifetime ban.
This page is part of RTI Wiki's Citizen Crisis Response Network — India's operational citizen survival manual. Updates tracked through EPFO circulars, MCA notifications, ICAI / NASSCOM advisories, and High Court judgments on employment-fraud.