India has become the victim of an other kind of terrorism from its neighbour, Pakistan. It is economic terrorism in printing and circulating counterfeit Indian notes. The Pakistani intelligence agency, ISI’s role in printing and circulation of fake Indian currency notes has never been a secret.
On its insistence, Pakistan Government has imported additional currency-standard printing paper from companies located in London to pursue its nefarious designs in India. Of late, Pakistan has been procuring currency-standard printing paper in huge quantities from London-based companies much higher than normal requirement of the country for printing its own currency. It is diverting it, to print fake Indian currency notes. It is believed that Pakistan Government printing press in Quetta (Baluchistan) Karachi’s security press, and two other presses in Lahore and Peshawar, are being used to print out counterfeit Indian currency.
The ISI has, been using Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) to transport counterfeit currency to its conduits in Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The modus operandi of the ISI was revealed by two Nepali counterfeit currency traffickers who were arrested by Thailand police sometimes back. During interrogation, the accused disclosed that they were working for a prominent Nepali businessman. The fact that Nepali territory is being used by Pakistanis to smuggle counterfeit currency is well known. The first such expose was made when Pakistani diplomats were caught distributing fake Indian currency notes. One Naushad Alam Khan, arrested in Dhaka on April 24, 2008, with fake Indian currency notes worth Rs 50 lakh admitted his direct link with HuJI (Bangladesh) chief Mufti Abdul Hannan. It was found that both Khan and Hannan had fought for Taliban in Afghanistan.
Fake Indian currency notes racket is being carried out by using the network of underworld kingpin Dawood Ibrahim, not only in India but also in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal in close association with different terror outfits, according to one intelligence report. With Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh being active partners, with India in probing fake Indian currency notes (FICN) related cases, it is safe to assume that so far as the fake currency in India is concerned, its source is Pakistan.
Delhi police claims, to have busted a major ISI network, sometimes back, which was reportedly being used to pushing fake currency into our country. Three arrested men, by name, Nayeem, Wasim and Mohammed Muslim, have revealed that Thar Express, so called, friendship train, running between Munnabao in Pakistan and Jodhpur in Rajasthan, was being used to smuggle fake currency into India . Investigation, uncovered, that the fake currency was arranged in Dubai. Fake currency to the extent of Rs 33 lakh was seized from them. They have confirmed that the Indian currency is printed in Pakistan and illegally pushed in India through Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Thailand.
The menace of finely printed currency has achieved new heights, that quite often, the customers do get fake currencies through ATMs. The worst is that when they approach banks with the complain of receiving a fake note, bank official impound the notes. As per the law of land, the bank should lodge an FIR with police, which would investigate the source of the fake currency. Banks obviously have not been to cope with the problem.
According to one Government committee estimate, counterfeit currency amounting to Rs 169,000 crore is floating around in the Indian financial system. This has been denied by the Reserve Bank of India. From real estate transactions to ordinary grocery shopping, paying to sources and terrorist’s expenses, these bogus notes are being used. Even if this figure is taken 20 to 25 per cent, as correct, it is still a huge amount, and sufficient to damage India’s economy. “In 2008, the CBI registered 13 cases having international/ inter-State ramifications relating to the recovery/ seizure of fake Indian currency notes,”
According to the National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB), between January and August 2008, 1,170 cases had been registered across the country in connection with fake currency. Bogus notes with a face value of Rs 3.63 crore had been seized. NCRB data shows 2,204 such cases were reported in 2007.
Investigations into the Mumbai 26/11 attacks have revealed that a large part of the money to fund the terror operation were obtained through fake currency rackets and hawala channels.
It is also believed that Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence raises Rs 1,800 crore (Rs 18 billion) annually to fund terror operations and that a major chunk of this amount comes in through fake currency rackets.
Intelligence sources believe that Rs 30 lakh of the Rs 50 lakh spent, on the attack on the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, in December 2005 was obtained through the fake currency racket. This is big menace, which should be tackled with no holds barred, even if it means walking with the devil till we have decimated this problem.
Fake currency and its linkage with crime
It is rightly said, that the poor of the world, cannot be made richer by redistribution of wealth. But, there are some, who seek a short cut, to riches through crime and use of counterfeit currency. Criminals believe, that whatever is worth doing is worth doing for the money. Nevertheless, the truth is that the wealth is the product of industry, ambition, character and untiring effort. The Special Task Force, (STF) of Uttar Pradesh, last year claimed to have busted a major international racket involved, in supply of fake currency notes.
It seized counterfeit Indian currency worth a face value of Rs 16 lakh. The gang leader, arrested in Lucknow with three of his aides, has confessed to have pumped into circulation over Rs 2 crore in counterfeit currency in India in about two months. The gang members arrested have been identified as Suhail Singh alias Ram Shanker Singh of Sikahira locality under Khodare police station of Gonda-the gang leader-along with Sharma Paswan, Vinod Kumar Misra and Sanjay Kumar Patel, all natives of Champaran in Bihar.
The gang was using a set of six women couriers from Champaran in Bihar and another set of four hailing from Nepal. The fake currency notes had a different serial number. It showed, that they had not merely been printed from a scanned image of a genuine note by using coloured scanners and printers. In case the miscreants scan a genuine note and print copies of it, the serial number of such counterfeit currency notes remain the same. Putting a different serial number on each note explains that the counterfeit currency was being printed at a very large scale.
During interrogation, the accused revealed that the counterfeit currency notes travelled to Uttar Pradesh from Nepal from two different routes: From Nepal to UP via Bihar and directly to UP particularly through Sidhartnagar and Maharajganj route. A Rs 1,000 denomination note was bought at the rate of Rs 500 to Rs 600 each while the Rs 500 denomination was bought for Rs 300 to Rs 400 each.
According to the accused, counterfeit currency notes of smaller denomination-like those of Rs 100 and Rs 50, were also available, but at a higher cost, as compared to the bigger denominations. The reason given was that putting the bigger notes into circulation was more risky. The gang used private vehicles to cross the Nepal borders while the rest of the movement was done preferably on public transport. To minimise suspicion, women couriers, particularly those with young children, were preferred to carry the counterfeit currency notes within India and were paid two per cent of the total face value of the counterfeit notes. A male shadow was also used to trail the couriers to ensure that they were not trapped by the police.
It is estimated that around 1,69,000 crores of fake rupees are in circulation all over India. Both Banks and Government are in a denial mode, because probably they do not know what to do.
(The writer is former Director CBI and can be contacted at [email protected])
