Discussions with a fellow PUBG user and subsequent purchase of a colour printer and specific paper rims of A4 size were broadly all it took him to start printing alleged fake Indian currency notes at his house. But luck ran out for 22-year-old Jaskaran Singh, alias Rajan, a resident of Basti Macchian in Zira town in the border district of Ferozepur, as within two months on August 2, he was arrested by police following a “tip off”. Word of mouth spread that there was an “unsuccessful attempt to circulate the fake currency among a group of gamblers”. Ferozepur police said that they seized from his possession fake Indian currency in denominations of Rs 500, Rs 200 and Rs 100 having a total value of Rs 3.42 lakh. The recovered fake currency included — besides the ready-to-use fake notes printed on both sides — those which were yet to be cut out of the A4 paper and those which were yet to be printed on the other side, a police officer said. The officer said that based on the tip-off, Rajan was booked under sections 178 (counterfeiting coins, government stamps, currency notes or bank notes), 180 (possession of forged or counterfeit coin, government stamp, currency-notes or bank-notes) and 181 (making or possessing instruments or materials for forging or counterfeiting coin, government stamp, currency-notes or banknotes) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) at the Kulgarhi police station. Subsequently, Rajan’s accomplice Akashdeep Singh of the same locality and almost the same age as Rajan was arrested, too. “Rajan gave fake currency having a face value of Rs 50,000 in the denomination of Rs 500 to Akashdeep, who tried to circulate it among a group of gamblers, but the move backfired and led to a scuffle as it emerged that currency notes were fake. The fake notes were torn off there and then,” Ferozepur Crime Investigation Agency (CIA) staff in charge Inspector Mohit Dhawan, who is privy to the investigations, told The Indian Express, adding that police were separately investigating the issue of gambling. Dhawan said Rajan started printing fake currency notes around a month and a half ago, and only a small amount of fake currency notes were used and given to small vendors like burger shops and fruit carts. “Rajan used to play PUBG games and held discussions with a fellow user who went by the username of Ajit. We are trying to ascertain the identity of Ajit,” the Inspector said. “Rajan inquired Ajit, who claimed to be from Delhi, about various things, including the availability of paper suitable for printing fake currency notes. Eventually, Rajan got a specific A4 size paper with a particular GSM (grams per square meter) from Ludhiana. He bought an HP Smart Tank 580 colour printer from Flipkart for about Rs 14,000,” said Dhawan, adding: “Rajan also claimed to have experimented with inserting the security thread by splitting higher GSM papers into two layers.” Dhawan said, “Rajan claims to have made only one fake currency note of Rs 500 as an experiment, but the note has not been recovered. The recovered notes were without security thread, but were perfect in terms of colour and alignment on both sides.” Investigating officer Gurdev Singh said, “Rajan's father is no more and his mother is an ad-hoc Class IV employee at a government school.” Gurdev Singh said a local court sent Rajan and Akashdeep to judicial custody on Thursday. Ferozepur Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Saumya Mishra said, “Rajan is a Class XII pass out in the arts stream. He took the help of a PUBG user and the Internet and watched related videos on YouTube and other platforms before printing fake currency notes. He also used the hit and trial method to add a security thread in the fake notes.”
