A special National Investigations Agency court in Bengaluru on Wednesday convicted three men in connection with a fake currency racket case within three years of their arrest. Mohammed Sajjad Ali, MG Raju, and Abdul Kadir pleaded guilty and were sentenced to six years of simple Imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 10,000, five years of simple Imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 5,000 and two years of simple imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 5,000 respectively.
According to the NIA, all them are residents of various localities within Bengaluru city.
They along with another co-accused Vanitha were arrested by Madanayakanahalli police in March, 2018. The four were booked under 489B (using fake currency) , 489C (possession of fake currency), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 34 (common intent) of the Indian Penal Code. Subsequently, the case was handed over to the NIA in September 2018. At the time of their arrest, police had recovered fake currency notes of face value of Rs 6,84,000 which were in fake notes of Rs 2,000 denomination.
The NIA in a statement, said, “During the investigation, the involvement of four more persons namely Vijay from Karnataka and, Sabiruddin, Abdul Kadir and Jahiruddin all from Malda, West Bengal was revealed. Vijay, Sabiruddin, and Abdul Kadir were arrested while accused Jahiruddin is still absconding. After completing the investigation, NIA filed a charge-sheet against four arrested accused viz. Mohammed Sajjad Ali, MG. Raju, Gangadhar Ramappa Kolkar and Vanitha on November 3, 2019 and subsequently supplementary charge-sheets were filed against Abdul Kadir on March 8,2019, Sabiruddin on September 5, 2019 and Vijay on June 20, 2020.”
It added, “Trial against the remaining four charge-sheeted accused is continuing. The further investigation against the absconding accused Jahiruddin is also continued.”
Incidentally, Karnataka is a hotbed for fake currency circulation. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, 18% of all fake currency was recovered from the state.