In a joint operation of Military intelligence and Pune City police's Crime Branch, a gang of seven people including a military serving person attached to Bombay Sappers with Rs 43 crores fake currency were arrested on Wednesday.
After counting, the Indian currency of various denominations worth Rs 43.4 crore was seized. The quality of the notes will be checked in due course by experts. Many of the notes are marked with 'Children Bank of India'.
The raid took place on Wednesday early morning in Pune based Vimannagar Sanjay Park area.
Military Intelligence (MI) team of Southern Command Liason Unit officers along with Pune city police's crime branch were working on a tip-off information about a large consignment of fake currencies being existing in Pune based Vimannagar area. Based on this tip, an operation was executed under the Pune city police Commissioner Dr K Venkatesham, Joint Commissioner of Police Ravindra Shisve based on which the team was led under Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) Bachchan Singh along with Crime branch Unit 4 and Anti-Narcotic Cell (West zone) team.
The team has recovered Indian Currency as well as foreign currency notes.
Police have identified the detained military serving person as Shaikh alim Gulab Khan who is deployed as Naik at Bombay Sappers. While other five has been identified as Sunil Badrinarayan Sarda, Ritesh Ratnakar,
Tufail Ahmed Mohd Ishaq Khan, Abdul Gani Rehmtullah Khan and Abdul Rehman Abdul Gani khan.
DCP Singh speaking to Sakal Times said, "Based on the inputs, our team started working on and on Wednesday we raided a rental apartment in Sanjay Park in which we have detained seven people including the military personal. On prima facie, our team have managed to count fake Rs 10 cores notes of Rs 2,000 and Rs 500 denomination. While there are still more. We have also recovered foreign currency notes as well as Rs 2.80 lakh cash. Our team is counting the notes and finding out the notes are fake or real one."
He added, "It seems the gang was operating via Hawala Racket. As the other five persons are belonging to such Hawala racket. Their modus was to exchange the Indian currency notes via other foreign notes. prima facia their modus seems to be cheating people using fake currencies. Further investigation is going on regarding the source of currency and others."
He said, "If anyone comes to them to exchanges notes they use to placed two-three real notes on the top side of the pack and fake notes were placed below. The Process of registering offence is going on at Vimantal Police Station under relevant sections of the law. The investigation will be done by crime branch Unit 4."
In the meantime, the Defence issued a statement about the incident as well as the military person involvement in it.
