Thermal Nagar police on Thursday nabbed five persons with demonetised currency notes of Turkey, worth about ₹2 crore, when they were trying to exchange it for Indian currency.
Police picked up N. Jeeva, 23, of Perur in Coimbatore, S. Vijayamanickam, 22, of Surandai in Tenkasi district, and S. Mohamed Bhukari, 22, A. Mohamed Riswan, 20, and M. Mohamed Asgar, 20, all from Kadayanallur in Tenkasi district, during patrolling.
When the patrol team led by Inspector Kokila checked the bags of the youth, the police personnel found that they were carrying 40 notes in Turkish currency, each worth about 5 lakh Turkish Lira. The exchange rate of a Turkish Lira worked out to ₹9.37 on Thursday.
The Turkish currency notes seized by police were notes demonetised in 2006 by the Eurasian Republic. The fivesome were, in fact, scouting for vulnerable targets with the demonetised notes, said S. Jayakumar, Superintendent of Police.
Further investigations were on to unearth the source from which the detained youth received the Turkish Lira.
