Poor targetted as carriers for smuggling for counterfeit money

Gangs have been using the poor to smuggle fake notes into India.

Gangs have been using the poor to smuggle fake notes into India.

HT Image

Most are forced into smuggling as they either want to enter India or return home but can’t afford to.

When crime branch officials arrested three Bangaldeshi nationals, including a woman, and seized fake currency worth Rs4.40 lakh in October 2012 at the western express highway in Borivli, they were surprised to find a one-year old girl with them.

On questioning the woman Papiya Sheikh, 26, the officials found that she wanted to come to India for a better life and was forced to carry the currency by their agent, who got them to the city via West Bengal.

Earlier, desperate labourers who wanted to return home from the Middle East were used as carriers. Gangs would send parcels of fake currency and in return, pay for their air fare.

Sources said that gangs send only a few lakhs’ worth of fake currency because there is no major loss if the carrier is caught and agencies are not alarmed.