Mumbai, A Mumbai police team has arrested two more persons, from Uttar Pradesh and Delhi, in connection with a postal stamp forgery racket, and recovered fake stamps with a face value of nearly ₹28 lakh from them, officials said on Wednesday.
With this, five persons have been arrested so far for their involvement in the racket which came to light in Mumbai last year.
The latest arrested accused were identified as Mohammed Shahabuddin Sultan Shaikh , a resident of Delhi, and Virender Sahadev Prasad , a native of Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh, an official said.
Both were apprehended by a team of the Mata Ramabai Ambedkar Marg Police Station on Sunday and brought to Mumbai. Police have recovered fake postal stamps with a face value of ₹27.84 lakh from the duo, he said.
Last year police had arrested three persons for their alleged involvement in the postal stamp forgery racket which was being operated from Delhi and Bihar.
The trio, Shamshuddin Ahmed , Shahid Raza and Rakesh Bind , was nabbed from different places and their bank accounts showed transactions of ₹8 crore, the official said.
The racket came to light after the Chief Post Master General of Mumbai received a complaint about forged stamps being used in bulk booking of letters and envelopes. The postal department conducted an internal probe, and subsequently lodged a complaint at the MRA Marg police station.
Based on the complaint, a case was registered under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita section related to counterfeiting coins, government stamps or bank notes.
Police first arrested Bind, a Mumbai resident who had a franchise to provide stamps for bulk orders. The probe then found links of the racket in Bihar and Delhi and led to the arrest of Ahmed and Raza.
The gang sold forged postal stamps at half their face value.
Search for a few more accused was underway, the official added.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.