The Nepal police on Friday arrested three Pakistani nationals at the Tribhuvan International Airport in possession of fake Indian currency amounting to Rs 7,67,94,000. Three others who came to receive them were arrested, too.
The three, Nasir Uddin, Mohammad Akhtar and Nadiya Anbar, arrived in Nepal from the Qatari capital Doha.
According to Kathmandu Post, the three had two briefcases full of Rs 2000 denomination fake Indian currency.
“We suspect the bills to be fake. We will send the bills to the Nepal Rastra Bank for further analysis,” Gajendra Kumar Thakur, chief at the airport customs, was quoted as saying by the Post.
Customs officials were alerted to something suspicious in one of the briefcases when the x-ray machine detected a huge quantity of papers in it.
An ‘RC’ tag, used to flag suspicious luggage, was placed on it following which the briefcase was manually checked.
Authorities then found it stuffed with wads of Rs 2,000 Indian currency bills.
Indian intelligence had reportedly alerted Nepal Police following which a trap was laid at Kathmandu airport.
The cops sent one of the arrested Pakistanis outside the airport with an empty briefcase and caught those who came to meet him.
The other three who came and were nabbed have been identified as Yunus Ansari, Suyal Khan and Sudan Ranabhat.
Police said that Ansari, the son of former minister, Salim Miya Ansari, was the intended recipient of the fake currency. He has previously been arrested twice – both times in connection with counterfeit Indian currency.
All six individuals will be sent to the Metropolitan Police Range, Kathmandu, for further legal proceeding.
Ansari was very close to Dawood Ibrahim and pumped FICN into India on the orders of ISI.