: The City Police on Thursday busted a suspected ‘hawala’ network, with the arrest of one person. The police seized Rs.60 lakh of unaccounted money from Najamuddin, a resident of Kilimanoor living at Karamana.
City Police Commissioner H. Venkatesh said Najamuddin was taken into custody from the Karamana bus-stand at 4.30 a.m. on Thursday. He had arrived by bus from Madurai, Tamil Nadu, with a bag containing Rs.59,88,000 in cash.
The police said Najamuddin, a suspected carrier who allegedly transacted Rs.57 lakh in two instalments over the last 11 days, was to hand over Thursday’s instalment to a person who was waiting at the Thampanoor bus-stand. Mr. Venkatesh said the cash was to be taken to Kozhikode. He reportedly told the police that the money had come from Mumbai and he was to hand it over to another carrier at Thampanoor. However, the person managed to escape by the time the police reached Thampanoor. The police have collected his details, including phone number, from Najamuddin, Mr. Venkatesh said.
Najamuddin was nabbed during a routine patrol led by Karamana sub-inspector C. Mohanan. The police questioned him after he was found moving around in suspicious circumstances at the bus-stand early morning after alighting from a Madurai bus.
Mr. Venkatesh said the cash seized from Najamuddin and all other details had been handed over to the Income Tax Department.
This is the second major hawala network being busted in the city this year, with the first being a seizure of Rs.60 lakh from two spots in March.
