Seven months after 14 passengers flew from Amritsar to London on Air India flights using forged digital immigration documents before seeking asylum in the United Kingdom, the special investigation team (SIT) probing the alleged human trafficking racket is set to again question three Air India employees, people familiar with the matter said.Investigators are yet to determine whether the airline staffers were merely negligent or knowingly facilitated the illegal immigration racket. (HT)The three AI staffers, as well as four employees of ground handling firm AI Airport Services Limited (AIASL), a public sector undertaking under the civil aviation ministry, have been called for a second round of questioning on July 24.They are among the 29 persons of interest identified by the SIT during a review meeting in Chandigarh on July 16, a senior officer associated with the investigation said on condition of anonymity.Investigators are yet to determine whether the airline staffers were merely negligent or knowingly facilitated the illegal immigration racket.The remaining persons under scrutiny include eight travel agents suspected of forging travel documents and the 14 passengers who travelled to the UK. The passengers boarded Air India flights AI-169 and AI-117 from Amritsar’s Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport between January 11 and 16 after presenting screenshots of forged electronic visa-related documents and employment papers stored on their mobile phones.Investigators allege that instead of verifying the passengers’ immigration status through the UK Home Office’s online system, airline personnel and AIASL staff relied solely on the documents displayed on the passengers’ mobile phones.“The staff failed to carry out the mandatory online verification before issuing boarding passes,” an investigating officer said.Advisories ignoredThe forged documents came to light after the first batch of five passengers landed in London on January 11. British authorities immediately alerted Air India about a suspected human trafficking breach, said an official of the Punjab Bureau of Investigation (BOI) which set up an SIT to probe an alleged protocol breach at the Amritsar international airport. Despite the alert, another batch of nine passengers carrying similar forged documents boarded an Air India flight from Amritsar on January 16, investigators said.According to a Union home ministry report forwarded to the Punjab BOI , the passengers are lodged in detention centres in the UK while their asylum claims are being processed. Under the home ministry’s immigration rules, airlines have the obligation to verify the validity of passengers’ visas before allowing them to board the flight.The SIT has concluded that airline personnel also failed to follow internal operating procedures that mandate document verification through official immigration portals. The report of an internal inquiry conducted by Air India’s Investigation and Fraud Prevention (IFP) Division accessed by HT concluded that check-in employees Balram Singh, Karanbir Singh and Mona failed to carry out mandatory immigration verification despite receiving compliance training. It also held duty managers and airport managers accountable for failing to detect repeated lapses.Prasad Rane, chief manager of Air India’s Investigation and Fraud Prevention Division, confirmed that the airline was extending full cooperation to the Punjab Police investigation. An Air India spokesperson said the airline would comment after examining the SIT findings.The forged documents were detected upon the passengers’ arrival at London’s Heathrow Airport, where they were detained after seeking asylum. According to a Ministry of Home Affairs report forwarded to the Punjab Bureau of Investigation, the passengers are lodged in detention centres in the UK while their asylum claims are being processed.Acting on inputs shared by British authorities, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs alerted the Punjab Bureau of Investigation, following which an FIR was registered in April at Mohali under Section 143(3) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita relating to human trafficking and Section 13(1) of the Punjab Prevention of Human Smuggling Act, 2012. An SIT headed by Superintendent of Police Richa Agnihotri was subsequently constituted to investigate the case.Airline officials in touch with immigration agents: ProbeThe SIT has also found evidence suggesting that some airline officials were allegedly in contact with immigration agents before the passengers boarded the flights, according to an official privy to the investigation so far. Investigators are analysing the nature of these communications to establish whether there was any criminal conspiracy.The probe is also examining the role of travel agencies suspected of facilitating the racket, said an BOI official. Investigators found that a single mobile phone number was used to book tickets for 10 of the 14 passengers. Moreover, immigration personnel have also been summoned after it was found that one of the 14 passengers, a Batala resident, is facing six criminal cases in Punjab.