The Hindu : Fake currency worth Rs. 4.72 lakhs seized

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jan 04, 2004

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Fake currency worth Rs. 4.72 lakhs seized

JALANDHAR JAN 3 . The Jalandhar police today claimed to have busted a gang indulging in circulation of fake currency smuggled into the country by a neighbouring country with the arrest of three persons and recovery of fake currency worth Rs 4.72 lakhs.

The district police chief G.S. Bhullar stated here today that on a tip-off that gang of certain criminals specialising in circulation of fake currency was active in the area and the gang had recently received a large consignment of fake currency notes of the large denomination, an operation was planned to apprehend the counterfeiters.

Special nakas were deployed at strategic points to intercept the accused and finally today morning four persons travelling in a Maruti car were intercepted at Nakodar-Kapurthala culvert, SSP said adding that search of the vehicle led to recovery of a briefcase containing large number of stacks of currency in the denomination of 500 and 1000 rupee notes.

In the meanwhile one of the four occupants managed to escape the police dragnet and the remaining three identified as Jagtar Singh, Buta Singh and Makhan Singh were arrested, he added.

The fourth absconding accomplice was identified as Joga, Bhullar said adding that out of the total fake currency recovered Rs 1.10 lakhs were in the denomination of Rs. 1000 and Rs 3.62 lakhs were in the denomination of Rs 500.

Bhullar further stated that during the preliminary interrogation of the arrested persons it has been revealed that Jagtar Singh was the leader of the gang and before involving himself into the present profession, he used to indulge in human trafficking to Dubai from India.

However, he was caught by Dubai police and sent to jail, where he came in touch with Sheikh Mohammed, a Pakistani national settled in Dubai, SSP said adding that Sheikh told him that he had links with the Inter-Services Intelligence of Pakistan and his brother Ahmed Mohammed had been living in Karachi where he was member of the racket promoted and sponsored by the ISI to smuggle fake Indian currency into India.

After coming out of the prison, Jagtar approached Sheikh and agreed to smuggle a consignment of fake currency to India. He brought fake currency worth Rs 9 lakhs with him for which he had to pay Rs 3 lakhs in genuine currency, SSP said adding that Jagtar found willing accomplices in Buta, Makhan and Joga and together they disposed the fake currency earning a clean profit of Rs 1.5 lakhs.

During his second trip to Dubai undertaken last month, Jagtar smuggled fake currency worth Rs 10 lakhs to the country and after disposing the consignment he went back to Dubai and returned with the largest consignment worth Rs 30 lakhs, SSP said.

The gang was operating in the area of Jalandhar city, Nakodar, Shahkot, Lohian, Adampur, Sultanpur, Hoshsiarpur, Anandpur Sahib, Moga and even Delhi, SSP said adding that gang had a very simple modus operandi for payment of genuine currency in lieu of fake currency that ruled out tracking of the source and made it almost undetectable.

Jagtar used to call a contact number of Ahmed in Karachi and the latter in turn call a number in Canada and the contact there would in turn call Dubai, SSP said. Sheikh would then call his contact at Jalandhar, who is a hawala racketeer and the terminal contact at Jalandhar would give a missed call at the cellular phone of Jagat and the price of fake currency would be paid to the hawala racketeer and ultimately reach Pakistan.

The busting of gang of counterfeiters has led to revelations that have deep ramifications and need to be probed further and efforts have been mounted to arrest the absconding member of the gang and the hawala racketeer identified during the preliminary interrogation of the arrested persons, SSP added. -- PTI

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Fake currency worth Rs. 4.72 lakhs seized