It’s all quiet on the eastern front. Demonetisation has brought smuggling activity to a near standstill along the 4,000-km India-Bangladesh border for the last one week. Normally, nearly $4 billion worth of cattle is smuggled to Bangladesh and fake currency comes in from across the border.
“Border ke aas-pas koi mutne bhi nehi jar aha hai (no one is going to the border even to pee),” said a senior security official in charge of the border along South Bengal districts that account for 80 per cent of the total smuggling activity on the Bangladesh border. The view is corroborated by a senior police official who didn’t want to be named. “We are relieved from the fake currency smuggling headache for the time being,” he said.
State police are expecting demonetisation to wipe out the trade in fake Indian currency notes (FICNs)for at least a year now. According to them, the turnover in illegal cattle trade could be conservative put at ₹25,000 crore. Of this, 60 per cent, or nearly ₹15,000 crore, is traded in fake currency.
An unofficial estimate suggests that out of every 1,000 currency notes of ₹1,000/500 denomination, at least five are fake. While the actual estimate of FICN will be known after completion of the demonetisation exercise, police sources say majority of fake notes are smuggled through the Bangladesh and Nepal borders making West Bengal the hub of FICN trade. Kaliachak in Malda district in West Bengal is one of the prominent smuggling routes.
“The density of fake currency in circulation is the highest in West Bengal,” a source said.
Over the past four years, Border Security Force (BSF) and other security agencies were grappling with fake currency smuggling through the South Bengal border.
In the last three years, FICN worth ₹6.6 crore has been seized by security forces. Eighty-five persons, including 11 Bangladeshi nationals, have been arrested. This year alone ₹1.35 crore was seized and 19 people arrested.
The seizure is considered a fraction of the trade.
“Certain areas such as Kaliachak have been prone to FICN smuggling. Over the past few years, we have raise the ante against them,” PSR Anjaneyulu, IG - South Bengal Frontier of the BSF, said. Minors are used in large numbers as couriers by the FICN smugglers.