A fake government office has been discovered in northern India that collected taxes, provided civic services and even handed out birth and death certificates, a report said Monday. An office was set up outside Jhansi town in Uttar Pradesh state and 20 people were employed to carry out jobs such as street sweeping.

I liked this part:

"He later seems to have decided to carry on with the office as it did not appear to be a loss-making proposition," an unnamed police officer was quoted by Times of India saying. The scam only came to light after some employees complained about salary problems to superiors in the actual government department, the report said. "We were shocked to hear this as we ourselves were not aware that our department had a branch office," R. Kulkshreshtra, an official with the Jhansi Municipal Corperation, told the newspaper.

Here is the story, here is another. Thanks to Sarah Jeong for the pointer.

Or if you’re interested in Indian outsourcing, try this, courtesy of Peter Clark.