Uttar Pradesh police seized about Rs. 10 lakh worth fake Rs. 2,000 notes on Saturday by busting a gang of suppliers of counterfeit notes in Meerut.
This comes 45 days after the Prime Minister rolled out demonetisation to deal with the fake currency problems in the country.
The police also arrested two people running the alleged gang, including Khushi Gandhi, who claimed to be the State president of the National Lokmat Party (NLP).
The Crime Branch also arrested Mr. Gandhi’s partner-in-crime Tauseef. A printing machine, paper used to print fake notes, colours and cutters were recovered from Mr. Gandhi’s house.
According to crime branch officials, Mr. Gandhi and his friend used to scan the original notes and print them on a light paper.
“We arrested them on a tip-off that they were on their way to supply the counterfeit notes in a car. The two accused accepted that they wanted to capitalise on the fact that people were not so aware about the new notes of Rs. 2,000 and Rs. 500, and they could easily be tricked into accepting fake notes as original. They had just started supplying the notes,” said a police official, adding: “Gandhi is a resident of the Bhawanpur village and was involved in political activities under the banner of the NLP. According to posters, he was also supposedly a candidate from the Kithor assembly constituency.”
Crime Branch sleuths tried the fake note of Rs. 500 in the market and found that the shopkeeper couldn’t distinguish the note from the original one.
“The two were giving Rs. 1 lakh of fake currency in lieu of Rs. 40,000 as original notes. They were using the banner of the political outfit to spread the fake currency silently in the market. We are in the process of interrogating the two accused to find out who were they in touch with to spread the net of counterfeit currency,” added a crime branch official.
