Delhi
NIA Related Incidents:2012

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has claimed to have busted a major Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICNs) racket and arrested 14 persons - including leaders of the gang operating out of Malda in West Bengal - during a nationwide swoop, reports Times of India. The accused were found to have direct links with their coordinators in Pakistan where these notes were printed. Four persons including the Indian kingpin Morgen Hussain were arrested from Malda while four others were arrested in Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh), three in Tamil Nadu and one each in Gulbarga (Karnataka), Moradabad (Uttar Pradesh) and Delhi. "Arrests show that the gang - part of an international network - had virtually a pan-India presence. Raids are still continuing in nine States including Bihar, Jharkhand, Haryana and West Bengal," said an unnamed official. He added that the seizures and subsequent probe supported India's claim about Inter Services Intelligence’s (ISI) role in its grand design to "destabilize the monetary stability of India" through pumping in huge numbers of FICNs. "Such a high quality of FICNs cannot be printed without government-linked agency's role or support. Though NIA had mentioned this in its earlier charge sheet in similar cases of Mumbai, the current seizures and disclosures made by the conduits have substantiated the charges," the official said. Referring to interrogation of the accused and technical surveillance, the NIA claims that the gang used to get its consignment of high quality FICNs - printed in Pakistan - through its network in Bangladesh and Nepal. It was found during the probe that the FICN -- in denominations of INR 1000, INR 500 and INR 100 - were smuggled to Bangladesh via air route before finally reaching its destination in different north-eastern and West Bengal villages. Besides using usual smuggling network, suppliers of these FICNs in Bangladesh also used to throw the bundles of FICN into the Indian villages bordering Bangladesh. "The accused persons with their aides used to collect the said FICN and distribute the same to the agents spread all over the country," the agency said. "The gang members used to transport the FICNs through trains and other modes of transport to all the states for its circulation. The local agents used to collect 60% of the value of FICNs from the circulators in genuine notes," it added. As per the deal, the genuine currency was then remitted to the bank accounts of the key persons by depositing amounts to the maximum of INR 49,000 to avoid being detected as suspicious transactions. "The network used bank accounts and ATMs for transferring back the genuine currency earned out of circulating the high quality, high value fake currency to the suppliers of the same based in Malda. The raids, which had begun on January 6, have led to the recovery of large number of ATM cards, bank passbooks, SIM cards and FICNs," the NIA said. The agency, which got help from different State Police during the raids, has, meanwhile, alerted the Border Security Force (BSF) to tighten its vigil along the Indo-Bangladesh border in the entire north-eastern region. Read less...

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on March 13 filed its first charge sheet in the September 7, 2011 Delhi High Court blast case, indicting six persons who according to the agency aimed to threaten the Judiciary so as to get December 13, 2001 Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru's death sentence commuted. Read less...

National Investigation Agency (NIA) raided an apartment at the Janakpuri area of New Delhi on the suspicion that Anti-Talks faction of United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA-ATF) ‘publicity secretary’ Arunoday Asom was in that apartment, The Sentinel reported on April 4. The apartment was said to be empty at the time of the raid. A person with the name of Aditya Baruah had rented the apartment. Baruah is a student of a private engineering institute in Delhi. Read less...

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on November 2 arrested Masthigudda Aboobacker, a Kerala native at New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport, after being deported from Abu Dhabi, reports Indian Express. Aboobacker allegedly ran an international ring dealing with Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICN) with the support by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and gangster Dawood Ibrahim. Apart from United Arab Emirate (UAE), Aboobacker also had operations in other West Asia countries, including Saudi Arabia. Preliminary questioning revealed he has been operating from Dubai for the past one year and used to shuttle between Pakistan, Bangladesh, Dubai and Nepal. It was revealed that the FICN was being printed in Pakistan and brought to India via Bangladesh and Nepal. He is also learnt to have provided the names of his handlers in ISI and Dawood’s gang. Read less...

Investigators have found evidence that links Indian Mujahideen's (IM) ‘India chief’ Yasin Bhatkal with the Delhi High Court unsuccessful bomb blast attack of May 25, 2011, Hindustan Times reports on January 1. The case is being investigated by the National Investigating Agency (NIA). Sources said the suspicion points at Yasin as the chemical impurities found in the ammonium nitrate fuel oil explosive outside the High Court match the impurities found by investigating agencies in ammonium nitrate seized from the Meer Vihar, Mundka (Delhi) factory of Mohammed Irshad (Yasin Bhatkal’s father-in-law) on December 1, 2011. Read less...