Joynal Abedin Khan :The detectives on the small hours of Tuesday arrested six members of a fake currency syndicate in the city’s Mirpur area and recovered Tk 50 lakh counterfeit notes from their possession. They also recovered money-making materials, four computers and three printers from their possession, Sheikh Nazmul Alam, Deputy Commissioner (Intelligence and Crime Information Division) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) told journalists at the media centre yesterday.The syndicate has taken a plan to release Tk 4 crore to 5 crore of counterfeit notes in the markets during the month of Ramzan, particularly ahead of the Eid-ul-Fitr festival, he said. The arrested persons are Md Shafiqul Islam, Sohag Adhikary, Sumon Ahmed, Bayezid Uddin, Siddiqur Rahman and Jesmin Akhter.”Circulation of forged notes takes place almost round the year. But it reaches the peak during Eid, Puja and other festivals when people spend a lot of money on shopping,” the DMP DC said.The fake currency syndicates are producing fake bank notes to circulate in the markets and shopping malls across the country as part of their target, the media conference was told.”The first group sells fake notes worth 100,000 at Tk 10,000 to 12,000 to the second group. The second group sells those at Tk 20,000 t0 25,000 to the third which circulates the notes in the markets,” Nazmul Alam said.The Detective Branch (DB) Assistant Commissioner Mahmud Naser Jony said that the racket was planning to circulate millions of forged notes ahead of Eid and Puja festivals.”The members of this racket have been producing fake notes for six to seven years. Several members of the gang have already been apprehended in previous months,” he said.On June 6, India and Bangladesh signed an agreement to combat the surge in currency counterfeiting.Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a speech during Dhaka visit that most of the counterfeit currency was coming into Bangladesh on way to India from a ‘third country’.The DMP DC said that one of the arrestees Shafiqul had been involved in this crime of trading fake notes for the past six to seven years. He operated this illegal trade by setting up forged money-making machinery in rented flats in different areas of Dhaka.”The notes were then supplied throughout the country by different gangs, especially before big occasions like Eid and Puja,” the DC said.The police official said Shafiqul and his associates were arrested several times in the past for the same crime.The arrested persons also confessed that they sell fake notes worth Tk 1 lakh for Tk 10,000 or Tk 15,000, he said.”Jesmin also used to rent flats in different areas of Dhaka and set up manufacturing units of fake bank notes, including Indian rupees, dollars, and euros. She circulated fake notes among the syndicate,” Nazmul Alam said.The arrested persons admitted that they use computer technology for making fake notes of Tk 50, 100, 500 and 1000 denominations within several minutes, he said.”We’ve stepped up vigilance against these types of unlawful activities around the capital city,” the police officer said, adding that the fake notes are technically and visibly too sound to detect.Police arrested 47 people in connection with producing fake notes in last one year, he added.The DC said the unearthed notes have all kinds of security detection marks, including fake security thread as used in the original denominations, panicking citizens of the country.Bangladesh Bank (BB) has taken measures to stem such crimes, said a high official of the bank. People must use finger pressing for a while over the notes to detect the fake notes, he said.If held vertically, the colour of the inscription changes from magenta to green or the other way round. In the previous Tk 500 note, only the upper-left of the front-back side of the inscription was printed with OVI (optically variable ink), the BB official added.
