Bihar fake currency case: NIA sentences key accused to 5 years imprisonment

A special NIA court in Patna has awarded five years of rigorous imprisonment, along with a fine, to a key accused in the East Champaran

New Delhi: A special NIA court in Patna has awarded five years of rigorous imprisonment, along with a fine, to a key accused in the East Champaran, Bihar in a fake currency case, officials said on Sunday, an official said.

The accused, identified as Raisuddin, has been sentenced to 5 years RI with a fine of Rs. 5000 under Section 120B of the IPC, with a similar quantum of sentence and fine also awarded respectively under Section 489B r/w 120B of the IPC, Section 16 of the UA(P) Act, Section 18 of the UA(P) Act, and Section 20 of the UA(P) Act. All the sentences will run concurrently, they said.

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Raisuddin, a resident of village Mohanpur, PS Vaishnavnagar, District Malda, West Bengal, was convicted on August 18, 2023, in the National Investigation Agency (NIA) case RC-15/2015/NIA-DLI, they added. According to the NIA, he is the fifth person to have been convicted and sentenced in the case relating to the East Champaran, Bihar, fake Indian currency notes case.

The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), Patna, had initially registered a case on September 19, 2015, in the matter following the recovery and seizure of high-quality Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICNs) of the face value of Rs 5,94,000 from another accused, Afroz Ansari. Afroz was carrying this consignment of FICNs to Raxaul, near the Indo-Nepal border, for further delivery in Nepal, they added. NIA had subsequently taken over the case and re-registered it on 23rd December, 2015.

Thorough investigations by the NIA led to the arrest and charge sheeting of eight accused persons over the last 8 years, on July 22, 2016, April 17, 2017, March 19, 2019, and July 5, 2023.

Of these, four accused, namely Afroz Ansari, Sunny Kumar alias Sunny Shaw alias Sujit Kumar alias Kabir Khan, Ashraful Alam alias Ishraful Alam, and Alomgir Seikh alias Raju, were convicted by the NIA Special Court on October 11, 2018.

They were sentenced to life in prison and fined Rs 30,000 each, they said. Trial proceedings against the remaining three accused are ongoing, they said.