Cheaper counterfeit notes in circulation

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The making of fake notes is getting more economical but that is also telling on their quality.

Investigations into the latest fake currency bust in Mumbai have revealed it takes only Rs 20 to churn out a fake Rs-100 note. This is less than half the cost that making the fakes recovered in the past entailed. Senior police officials, who busted fake-currency rackets in the past, told TOI fraudsters would spend at least Rs 450 on making a Rs-1,000 fake.

But all this is telling on the quality of the fakes. The old fakes were at least 95% close to the original Rs-1,000 notes. But the new fakes, that cost only onefifth of the originals, have only about 70% features matching with the originals.

In April, the ATS seized 45 notes of Rs 1,000 denomination, of high quality. The case was handed over to the National Investigaing Agency (NIA) after notes of the same series were found in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Goa. “Those notes were from a government printing press in Quetta, Pakistan,’’ said the officer. He added the foreignbased manufacturers do not want to earn profit but to subverse the Indian economy. The seizure was followed by several meetings between RBI officials and the police.

On Wednesday, the ATS arrested three persons, Mohammad Arshad (35), Zakir (37) and Matlu (36), from Juhu and recovered fake currency of Rs 78,400 from them. The trio was staying in Malvani. Police claimed they got a tip off and arrested them. Two of the three accused are from Delhi and the third is from Lucknow. “The notes are of low quality and the paper used to manufacture them is also of poor quality. Those arrested were carriers and the notes were made in India only,’’ said ATS chief K P Raghuvanshi.

Police said the notes were made in Kanpur. “The manufacturers would scan a Rs 100 note and then print it on plain paper. They used a cutter to cut the note. Due to lack of technical expertise, there are several loopholes, like the image of Mahatma Gandhi on the left side of the note is almost invisible,’’ said an officer.

He added poor ink was used to print the watermark and silver line. “The manufacturers hardly spent Rs 20 for each note’’ said an offier.

The notes were circulated not on commission basis, but the carriers “bought three Rs 100 notes by giving a genuine Rs 100 note to the manufacturers,’’ added the officer.

What gave away the fake Rs 100 notes:
* Paper quality is poor, instead of imported paper used by the government printing press
* The paper was too thick as compared to the original notes
* Security thread was not prominent. Besides, the Gandhi image on the left of the Rs 100 note was too light, making it almost invisible
* There was no watermark on the notes
* The silver line in the middle was visible on some notes
* The fake notes were scanned and printing was blurred
ORIGIN: Manufactured in Kanpur
COST: Police suspect that the cost of manufacturing a fake Rs 100 note was around Rs 20 each
AIMED AT: These notes were aimed to be circulated in slums and among semi-literate or illiterate people like auto drivers, porters and roadside tea stalls etc

Reality about fake notes How the Rs 1000 fakes stood apart
* The Rs 1,000 denomination notes seized by the ATS in April, 2009 contained Optically Variable Ink, but the RBI said the ink was not of too good quality
* The notes had latent image of the numeral ‘1000’ on the right side of the note, but the ink was light
* The letters ‘RBI’ and the numeral ‘1000’ can be seen with the help of a magnifying glass in the area between the Mahatma Gandhi portrait and the vertical band. However, the ‘RBI’ and ‘1000’ were less in number
ORIGIN: Suspected to have been printed in a government press in Quetta, Pakistan
COST: Cops say such high-quality fakes would cost Rs 450 per note to make
AIMED AT: Such notes were aimed for circulation in big cities like Mumbai, Ahmedabad, and Goa

RBI panel’s observation:
A report by an RBI-appointed committee says in 2008-09, the number of counterfeit notes detected at RBI offices and bank branches rose 103.3% over the previous year. It has recommended several measures including installing note sorting machines at banks

The Times of India, August 22, 2009