Fake currency worth Rs 1.35 crore confiscated

Nashik: In a major haul, the police has seized fake currency notes with face value of Rs 1.35 crore in scrapped denominations of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 here and arrested 11 persons, including a local NCP worker, a senior police officer said on Saturday.

The incident occurred on Friday evening when a police team laid a trap and intercepted four cars in Adgaon area, said city police commissioner Ravindra Singhal. “Police found fake currencies in old denominations of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500, totalling Rs 1.35 crore, in the cars and arrested 11 men,” he said.

The scrapped notes were being brought to Nashik from Dhule. Mr Singhal said the police is trying to trace the recipients who were supposed to take the delivery of the consignment. “We are also probing the motive behind printing fake currency notes at a time when Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes have already been banned on November 8,” the commissioner said.

Among the arrested persons is one Chhabu Nagare, a former president of NCP’s city unit Youth Wing, and Ramrao Patil, a contractor who supplies garbage-collecting vehicles for Nashik Municipal Corporation. According to sources, Mr Nagare is considered close to a NCP heavyweight from the region.

The other accused hailed from Pune, Mumbai, Navi Mumbai and Thane. They have been identified as Sandeep Saste (45), a resident of Pune, Ramesh Pangarkar (63), Ishwar Parmar (50), Nilesh Layse, and Praveen Mandhare (all from Mumbai), Rakesh Karkur (29), a resident of Thane, Gautam Jadhav, from Navi Mumbai, Santosh Gaikwad (43) and Prabhakar Ghate (44), both from Nashik.

All the accused were produced in a local court, which remanded them in police custody until December 29.