Tags:
Journalism of Courage
SURAT, April 5: The Local Crime Branch LCB of the district police unearthed a major racket of fake currency notes and arrested six people in the connection. A total 37 fake notes of Rs 100 denomination were seized from them.
According to details, Shailesh Pathak, originally from Nanivaavdi in Bhavnagar, Jagdish alias Katre Bhura Patel from Amreli, Ramesh alias Ramnik Dobariya from Amreli, Velji Patel from Talaja in Bhavnagar, Govind Jajaliya from Amreli and Das alias Parshottam Desai from Bhavnagar were arrested and produced before a magistrate on Monday and remanded to LCB custody for three days.
District Superintendent of Police DSP V M Pargi said on Monday evening that in all 700 fake notes had been circulated. He said the six were currently residing in the Varachha and Kapodara areas and had brought the notes from Saurashtra.
None of those arrested, however, have have any connection with Ramesh Khaini, who was caught by the police with electronic gadgets used in printing fake notes last month. All the 37 notes that have been seized are photocopies of genuine notes of the series OML 224102 to OML 224115. Each note had been photocopied on a colour copier machine a number of times and were being circulated in the market.
LCB PI S A Sardar said on Monday that the arrest of one Dharmesh Maisuriya with one fake Rs 100 note led to the arrest of Shailesh Pathak, who he said was a journalist. Shailesh had reportedly given 40 fake notes to Dharmesh. When questioned, Shailesh said he had got them from Jagdish and Das. While Das runs a cable connection business, Jagdish is unemployed.
Velji had admitted to have thrown 100 fake notes in the air and also had given such notes to the playing band at a marriage ceremony of his cousin held in Amreli a few months ago. One of the band players later discovered that he had a fake note and lodged a complaint in the Alang police station.
