Fake note racket with Pakistan links busted

HYDERABAD: A well-knit country-wide network of persons who were circulating fake Indian currency notes (FICN), printed in Pakistan and smuggled from the porous Indo-Bangladesh border, was busted in a joint operation by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), Border Security Force (BSF) and the West Bengal police on Saturday.Ten people were arrested and fake currency worth Rs 27,000 seized from them.The gang, however, had already managed to circulate fake notes worth a crore of rupees.Sleuths of NIA Hyderabad branch arrested 23-year-old Morgen Hossain from Malda district of West Bengal on Saturday and seized fake notes worth Rs 27,000 from him.On the leads provided by Hossain, the alleged kingpin, further raids were conducted all over the country and nine more persons were arrested.The gang acted at the behest of terrorist organisations who wanted to destabilise the country through the circulation of fake currency, NIA officials said.According to NIA, the arrested persons had a nationwide network.Huge quantities of high-quality fake notes, in denominations of Rs 1,000, Rs 500 and Rs 100, printed in Pakistan, were smuggled to Bangladesh by air route and from Bangladesh were thrown into Indian villages along the border.Hossain and his gang collected the counterfeit currency from the border area and distributed it to agents across the country. Young unemployed youth were roped in from Malda and sent as construction labourers to all major cities and towns to distribute the fake notes. The local agents, who exchanged the fake notes for genuine ones, took a 40 per cent cut.Rest of the money was remitted to Hossain's bank accounts, who in turn pass on some percentage to Bangladeshi and Pakistani suppliers, NIA officials said.The fake notes were exchanged in the ratio of 1:3 of the face value.