In a major crackdown, Sambalpur police on Sunday busted a gang involved in printing fake Indian currency notes.
As per preliminary reports, fake notes worth Rs 13 lakh were recovered from six persons who have been arrested on the charges of running the racket.
All the seized counterfeit notes are in 2,000, 500 and 100 rupee denominations. Besides, police have seized printer and other materials that were being used to manufacture the fake currency notes.
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Sambalpur SP B Gangadhar said that the racket was busted while carrying out an investigation regarding a dispute between two youths and owner of a tea stall.
"We had recovered some cash from the two accused and later found those to be fake. Later, a detailed investigation was carried out in this connection," said Gangadhar.
After it was revealed that the fakes were being printed at Chhattisgarh and circulated through some youths in Bargarh, a special team was constituted to conduct further investigation.
"Initially, we found that the fake notes were supplied to the accused in Bargarh through some middlemen in Chhattisgarh. Later, we managed to nab the Chhattisgarh based supplier," Sambalpur SP added.
It is pertinent to mention here that Odisha police had seized a major haul fake notes with a face value of a whopping Rs 7.9 crore from a car in Koraput district on March 2, 2021.
A total of 1,580 bundles (each bundle consists of 100 notes in the face value of Rs 500 denomination) worth Rs 7.9 crores were seized from the car during a vehicular inspection by Koraput police near Sunki beat house area.