Manipur Police busts massive fake currency and drugs racket in Imphal; two arrested

In a major success, the Anti-drug cell of Imphal East Police busted a fake currency as well as a drug racket on Thursday and recovered a huge cache of fake currency notes and drugs from the gang. The racket was busted at the Urup Kangthak village and Keirao village area of Imphal East district in Manipur, officials said. 

While the officials also recovered narcotics and several bundles of 500 currency notes, two people were also arrested in the matter. According to the local media, the police also found several items used for printing the fake notes. 

“We recovered 3,790 suspected World is Yours (WY) drugs, 60 grams of suspected Heroin, 26 bundles and 89 numbers of 500 fake currency notes and 101 numbers of 500 fake currency uncut sheets,” the police said further adding that an investigation is presently underway. 

Notably, this came days after the Assam Police in July also busted a fake currency racket in Guwahati and arrested a person in connection. The police also seized a Fake Indian Currency Note (FICN) printing machine, along with counterfeit notes and other materials used in making the currency notes from the accused. 

Task force employed to counter smuggling of fake notes

Keeping in view the reduction in the value of counterfeit notes in the banking system, Union Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary had earlier informed the Lok Sabha that there have been instances where it has been found that fake currency has been smuggled from neighbouring countries. 

“While notes seized by different law enforcement agencies have gone up, there is a discernible trend of reduction in the number of counterfeit notes detected in the banking system,” he said.

However, to counter the smuggling of fake notes, a joint task force is presently functioning between India and Bangladesh for building trust and cooperation for the exchange of information and analysis of smugglers of FICN. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was also signed between both countries to prevent and counter the smuggling and circulation of fake currency notes.

Image: ANI