Indian Student Fakes Father's Death For US Scholarship. Gets Arrested

An Indian student was arrested and deported after it came to light that he falsified documents to obtain a full scholarship. Aryan Anand, a student at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, boasted about building “his life and career on lies” in a now-deleted Reddit post, which was later flagged by a platform moderator.

Anand made a stunning confession about how he forged his class 10 board exam results and used fraudulent means to secure admission to a US college with a full scholarship.

It included fabricating transcripts, essays and even the death certificate of his father, who is alive. After successfully deceiving his way into college, the 19-year-old admitted he lost interest in his studies, turned to heavy drinking and cheated in exams to maintain his scholarship. He also faked internships to earn money.

Anand was arrested two months ago and faced up to 20 years in prison for felony counts of forgery and theft of services, reported 6ABC. However, at the request of university officials, he was expelled and deported to India instead.

Lehigh University, in a statement, said, “We appreciate the report and the thorough investigation that brought this matter to light.”

Michael Weinert, Northampton County Assistant DA, explained how the Reddit moderator connected Anand to Lehigh University. “The defendant only had one other university that he followed, which was Lehigh University. So, the moderator reached out to Lehigh to give them a heads up,” Mr Weinert said, as per 6ABC.

Mr Weinert praised Lehigh University's thorough investigation, saying, “It was challenging to verify the facts, but Lehigh and their police force did an excellent job of digging deep and uncovering the truth.