5 held in fake currency racket

Mumbai, June 23 (UNI) Five members of a Jharkhand-based gang, allegedly involved in a counterfeit currency racket, were arrested by the Crime Intellegence Unit sleuths here today.

Counterfeit notes in the denominations of Rs 1000 and Rs 500 and with a total face value of Rs 8.05 lakh were seized from them.

Joint Commissioner of Police Rakesh Maria, while informing mediapersons about the arrests, said the CIU unit had received information that a Jharkhand-based gang was active in circulating counterfeit currency notes in the metropolis.

Acting on the information, the CIU sleuths laid a trap at Megawadi in southcentral Mumbai and nabbed Saif Ali Sheikh (55).

Upon interrogation, Saif revealed the names of his accomplices -- Mazboob Sheikh (34), Farooq Sheikh (32, Gulam Sheikh (22) and E Rehman (23).

Gulam Sheikh has told the police that the fake notes were obtained by his cousin Ejauddin Sheikh, based in Jharkhand, from a Bangladeshi named, Jamal Mallik.

The five, police claim, have admitted that they had arrived in Mumbai three months back with fake notes amounting to Rs 8.8 lakh in face value. The police have seized Rs 8.05 lakh worth of notes and suspect that the rest, amounting to Rs 75,000, must have been put into circulation through the wholesale market.

Those arrested were produced before Additional Metropolitan Magistrate N N Srimangle, who remanded them in police custody till June 27.

UNI ST MAZ AKJ AS1927