Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...
Fake currency case Nagpur
The Special Court of Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) convicted and sentenced four persons to 12 years’ rigours imprisonment in a fake currency case. Counterfeit currency notes totalling around Rs 9.10 lakh was seized from the convicts by ATS Nagpur in 2015 from Shalimar Express at Nagpur Railway Station.
P Y Ladekar, Additional Sessions Judge - 4 and Judge Special Court (ATS), Nagpur held the act of circulating counterfeit currency as the act of terror under the provisions of The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
The convicts are identified as Sheikh Gaffar Sheikh Mussa, Sheikh Sattar Sheikh Mussa and Mohd Obedulla Sakir Ali, all residents of Ballarshah, Chandrapur; Mir Anwarul Mir Hossain, a resident of Malda, West Bengal.
It was the prosecution’s case that the ATS Nagpur received information that Mir Anwarul who deals in fake currency would come to Nagpur by 18030 - Shalimar Mumbai Ltt Express on October 4, 2015. A trap was laid and Mir Anwarul was arrested with fake currency of Rs 9.10 lakh. A case was registered by the ATS against him. During investigation, the ATS officials arrested Sheikh Gaffar, Sheikh Sattar and Mohd Obedulla from Balharshah, Chandrapur.
The ATS filed 600 pages of chargesheets in the court. The court examined 31 witnesses during the trail and none of them turned hostile. The prosecution proved the charges against the accused with help of seizure report, Currency Note Press Nashik’s report and handwriting reports of the accused persons. The prosecution established the links of Sheikh Gaffar, Sheikh Sattar and Mohd Obedulla with Mir Anwarul were established by the prosecution by producing their transaction details. Mir Anwarul, who is the prime accused in the case, had received lakhs of rupees from the three accused persons to provide them counterfeit currency, the prosecution told the court.
Mir Anwarul, Sheikh Gaffar and Sheikh Sattar were convicted under Sections 489 (b), 489 (c), 120 (b) of Indian Penal Code and Section 16 and 18 of UAPA. The Court sentenced them to imprisonment of 12 years and imposed a fine of Rs 16 lakh on each. Mohd Obedullah convicted under Sections 489 (b), 489 (c), 120 (b) of Indian Penal Code and Section 18 of UAPA. The Court sentenced him to 12 years of imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 15 lakh.
Mir Anwarul was in custody from October 2015 while Sheikh Gaffar and Sheikh Sattar were in custody from November 2015. Mohd Obedulla has been in custody from April 2016. Their sentence will be set off against this period. The case was investigated by the then ATS PI V D Mishra and currently supervised by ACP ATS Abhay Panhekar.
Special public prosecutor for ATS Prashant Kumar Sathianathan, Advs Neh Nandini Singh and Vedant Datey represented the State.
Pakistan connection of fake currency notes
The prosecution told the court that Mir Anwarul was the prime accused in the case. The counterfeit currency was printed in Pakistan and smuggled to Bangladesh to circulate in India. During the trial, the prosecution produced the list of more than 70 offences of fake currency notes which were registered across India. Adv Sathianathan told ‘The Hitavada’ that the convicts sent money to Mir Anwarul to Malda from their bank accounts in Balharshah to get the fake currency. As against Rs 40,000/-, Mir Anwarul was issuing fake currency of around Rs one lakh to the accomplices, he said, and added that the fake currency notes were smuggled to Malda from Bangladesh.
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