Two officials of RBI held for illegal swap of old notes

New Delhi: The CBI arrested two employees of the Reserve Bank of India’s cash department in connection with an alleged conversion of Rs 1.99 crore of the demonetised currency with specified bank notes of Rs 2,000 and Rs 100 in Bengaluru on Saturday.

According to sources, senior special assistant Sadananda Naika and Special Assistant A.K. Kavin were arrested for unauthorised exchange of the currency and have been booked under the charges of criminal conspiracy and cheating, besides provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

Both of them have been sent to four-day CBI custody by a special court, they said. “It has been alleged that both the accused and other unknown officials of the RBI, Bengaluru, entered into a criminal conspiracy with other unidentified people,” said a senior CBI official.

He said in furtherance with the criminal conspiracy, the accused, along with other unknown officials, who were entrusted with the responsibility of new currency notes, “fraudulently” gave away new notes to the tune of Rs 1.99 crore to RBI officials and others. It is alleged the exchange was done in violation of exchange limits imposed by the bankers’ bank.

Earlier, the agency had arrested another employee of the RBI in a separate case, in which currency worth over Rs 6 lakh was converted by him using his influence over officials of the State Bank of Mysore.