Police in southern Guangzhou city have arrested three people suspected of making more than 50,000 fake train tickets worth 4 million yuan during the Spring Festival travel peak.

The gang was alleged to have made fake train tickets by computer and sold them at highly-inflated prices from January along lines between Guangzhou, capital of southern Guangdong Province, and Hengyang, of central Hunan Province.

Most of the tickets were for standing room, said police.

The three suspects were alleged to have earned as much as 160,000 yuan in half a month.

Train tickets were a hot commodity in China before the Spring Festival as hundreds of millions of people tried to return home for family gatherings, with some forced to pay scalpers hefty sums.

A passenger in Hengyang reported to the police on Jan. 26 that he was charged 120 yuan from an unofficial vendor in Guangzhou Railway Station for "service fees" which was more than the cost of the ticket.

The confiscated fake tickets looked almost identical to the real ones in paper quality, printing, and even had anti-counterfeiting labels, police said.

The alleged principal of the gang surnamed Feng admitted that he had traveled to Guangzhou, Beijing, Shanghai and other cities to find the most suitable paper for making the tickets, police said.

(Xinhua News Agency February 14, 2008)