Four held over fake currency possession

Four persons hailing from Murshidabad, close to Bangladesh border, in the state of West Bengal have been arrested from Mumbai for allegedly possessing fake Indian currency, which looked as good as the real ones, confirmed the Oshiwara police.

The Asian Age last month had highlighted how out of the Rs 1.4 crore of counterfeit currency seized in 2015, about Rs 44.87 lakh i.e. 33 per cent, by far the highest, was seized by the Mumbai police. Most of these notes are of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 in denomination.

The arrested accused, who were arrested on Friday after a tip-off, are identified as Mohamad Tauhatul Islam (20), Jianul Razak Shaikh (27), Mustafa Razak Shaikh (25) and Marjini Baby Ashrapur Shaikh (27). All are labourers and live in slum pockets between Goregaon and Jogeshwari.

Fake currency notes having a face value of Rs 78,000 have been seized from the quartet. Out of this 60 notes are of Rs 1,000 and 36 notes of Rs 500 denomination. It is reliably learnt that they had brought in Rs 1 lakh worth of fake currency and have managed to circulate rest of the fake notes.

The quartet was arrested on Friday afternoon from Anand Nagar junction and on Saturday produced before a magistrate’s court that has remanded them to police custody. Further probe is on.

“They have been booked under section 489 A (counterfeiting currency notes) B (using as genuine forged currency) C (possession of fake currency), 120 B (criminal conspiracy) and 34 (common intention) of Indian Penal Code,” said senior police inspector Subhash Khanvilkar of Oshiwara police station.

The menace had forced the BEST bus conductors to reject notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 as they were not able to differentiate the real notes from the fake ones.