Bareilly: A team of Uttarakhand special task force has arrested one Mohammed Irtaza from Sheikhul-Hind colony of Deoband in Saharanpur district and recovered from him fake currency worth lakhs as well as a printing machine.According to local intelligence sources, Uttarakhand STF brought one Muneer, who was arrested from Roorkee a couple of days ago with a huge consignment of fake currency, with them and raided Irtaza’s house in Deoband acting on a tip-off from him late on Friday night.The landlord, Rashid Siddiqui, at whose accommodation the accused Irtaza had been staying for months, told TOI that police recovered a printer and other incriminating material from his room.While local police said they had no knowledge of the STF raid, neighbours said the team also seized a Scorpio which belonged to the accused, and on which, he had had got ‘Pradhan Mantri Pariyojana’ imprinted.According to landlord Siddiqui, Irtaza is from Bagowali village in the neighbouring district of Muzaffarnagar. He said Muneer had introduced him to Irtaza to get one of his rooms on rent. “Three or four of Irtaza’s friends used to stay with him in the night. I guessed they would be studying here, but never knew about the fact that they were indulged in printing counterfeit notes,” Siddiqui said.Neighbours said that they had little knowledge about Irtaza who moved about in the SUV. As the vehicle had ‘Pradhan Mantri Pariyojana’ imprinted on it, they were under the impression that he was a government officer or a big shot with connections in the government.According to local residents, the STF team recovered a big consignment of fake currency notes of 500 and 2,000 denominations, one laptop, a printing machine, paper cutter and other stationary items.Notably, three months ago, Deoband police had busted another fake currency racket in Thitaki village here.

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