Four held in Borivli with fake currency worth R 4.5 lakh

After arresting three people, the crime branch claimed to have busted a gang, circulating counterfeit Indian currencies in the city. HT reports.

After arresting three people, the crime branch claimed to have busted a gang, circulating counterfeit Indian currencies in the city.

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Over Rs 4.5 lakh fake notes have been recovered from the gang members. The kingpin of the gang, alias Munirul Islam Luttu Sheikh alias Daku Mama, who is suspected to have been smuggling the fake currency from Bangladesh, is still at large.

Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Himanshu Roy said they arrested Anil Saha (30), Vishnu Saha (41) and Roshan Kumar alias Rakesh (35) after a tip-off about the movement of the gang in the western suburbs.

The gang members were rounded up between August 6 and August 17 from near Sanjog Hotel in Borivli (W) where they had come to deliver the consignments totalling Rs 4, 57,500 — 299 were of Rs 1,000 denomination while the rest Rs 500.

Roy said they would pass of as genuine without close scrutiny. “Their security features are of very high quality,” Roy said. The police will seek help from the RBI to ascertain their quality and the place where it could have been manufactured.

Vishnu is a resident of Anantpur village in Malda in West Bengal, which is not far from the Bangladesh border.

Roy said Daku Mama would exchange Rs 100 fake for every Rs 35 genuine currency. Anil is from Sansarpur village in Bihar. He was a schoolteacher, but joined the gang after he was removed from his job. Rakesh, a resident of Khagaria district in Bihar, has four cases of murder (and under Arms Act) registered against him in Bihar and Delhi.