Government needs to Implement Strict Measures for Preventing such Incidents in Future.
While the entire country is steadily coping with the brunt of denomination, government is yet to face major challenges like forgery of new notes. Monday evening, a 60-year-old named Lal Singh was busted in Chirawa town (District: Jhunjhunu) for using a coloured replica of the newly introduced Rs. 2,000 note at a local liquor shop. Issues like these impose a serious threat to our nation’s fragile economy and several citizens have requested the government to reveal identifying factors for new currency.
Apparently, the salesman, who was unaware of this fraud mistook it for genuine currency and accepted the copy. Due to unavailability of change, he asked the customer to wait. This triggered an argument between the salesman and the customer, who was looked restless with each passing second. Getting suspicious of his activities, the salesman reported this issue to the cops. Senior police officer from Chirawa station arrived on spot to delve into this matter.
“The accused identified as Lal Singh came to the liquor shop and gave a piece of paper which he claimed to be a genuine currency note of Rs 2,000. Since the shop was crowded, the salesmen initially put it in the cash box believing it to be genuine. He asked the old man to wait for getting the amount to be refunded. That’s when the Lal Singh started arguing and was getting restless. Thus, on the basis of suspicion, we were informed by the salesman and we found that the it was a fake currency,” he says. (Source: TOI, Jaipur)
The accused was detained on grounds of forgery but he claimed that someone else had handed him this fake 2000 rs note. It seems that he was asked by an unknown person to buy a quarter bottle of a whiskey. As of now, the matter is under investigation. If the old man is honest, the police will let him off the hook else he would land in trouble for using duplicate 2000 Rs. note.
While this may not seem a significant issue but it’s a matter of serious concern for the government, which is rigorously trying to stabilize Indian economy by eliminating fake currency and black money from the system. Public unawareness on new currency will give way to more crimes in future. The bigger issue is if the poor man was fooled by a con artist, he has ended up losing Rs. 2000, which is a big amount for daily labourers, farmers and workers. We might see a repeat of such episodes in villages and towns, where majority of folks are ignorant and illiterate or underexposed. The Centre needs to come up with genuine currency identification points for the safety of public money. Also, they need to execute strict measures to eradicate such loopholes in monetary system.
