A BANGLADESHI national, who used false material in an effort to obtain a British passport, was jailed for two years.

Judge Isabel Parry also recommended that 38-year-old Ferdaus Sohel be deported.

Sohel, of Commercial Road, Newport, was found guilty of using false identity documents with the intention of using it for registerable facts about himself.

Prosecutor Claire Pickthall said that on June 10 this year Sohel went to Newport Passport Office and submitted an application for the renewal of his British passport.

He produced a passport in the name of Toful Jagirdar whose year of birth was 1973.

The application went through the system but when checks were made it was discovered that the passport with the application form had been cancelled in 2004.

That passport, said Miss Pickthall, has been reported lost or stolen.

It was established that that passport has been issued to a person of a totally different appearance to Sohel.

She said that photographs submitted with the passport with the application has been changed and the original pictures replaced.

Sohel returned to the Passport Office on June 16 intending to collect the renewed item but he was arrested.

At his home the police found a number of "significant documents". There was a Bangladeshi passport issued to Sohel with his photograph inside and there was also a visa issued to him in June 1999 allowing him to enter the United Kingdom for just six months.

He maintained to the police that the passport in the name of Jagirdar was his.

Sohel, who had denied the charge, said he had been born in Birmingham in 1973 and called himself Jagirdar.