Bank Note Press official nabbed with Rs90 lakh stolen notes

Following a serious breach at the government mint, the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) on Friday nabbed an official of the Bank Note Press of the Reserve Bank of India at Dewas in Madhya Pradesh for stealing currency notes worth Rs90 lakh.

The official, Manohar Verma, was posted as deputy control officer at the Note Verification Section of the Bank Note Press.

The CISF personnel deployed at the section noticed that Verma would often go near an empty wooden box lying in the corridor and stoop under a table. The CISF personnel became suspicious that Verma was hiding something and kept Verma under CCTV surveillance since Thursday.

The CISF then informed their superiors of the matter who came to the spot, a CISF spokesperson said.

Manohar Verma was physically searched, and two bundles of currency notes in the denomination of Rs200 were found concealed in his shoes. Thereafter, a thorough search of his office was carried out by the CISF in the presence of senior officials of the Bank Note Press.

During the search, 4,743 currency notes in the denomination of Rs500 and 1,189 notes in the denomination of Rs200, worth a total of Rs26,09,300 were recovered, CISF spokesperson Hemendra Singh said in a statement.

Verma was an officer, and as per the procedure, the clothes and shoes of officers are not removed during checking when they are going out of the high-security zone of the Bank Note Press, Singh said.

The CISF handed over Verma along with the seized currency notes to the police for legal action.

Subsequently, the police registered a case against Verma. As part of the investigation, the police searched his residence and recovered currency worth Rs64.50 lakh.