Biggest haul of demonetised currency seized from Kanpur home; cash worth nearly Rs 100 crore recovered

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) and Uttar Pradesh Police have recovered banned currency notes worth close to Rs 100 crore from a house in Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh. The haul, with banned notes making up a bed-sized stack of cash, is the biggest since Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes were removed as legal tender in November 2016 during the demonetisation drive. According to a Hindustan Times report, an NIA official said that the currency belonged to four-five “individuals or companies”, including a prominent detergent-maker.

Demonetized currency worth crores seized from a residential premises in Kanpur, counting underway, questioning on. pic.twitter.com/DejcQ7hEJb

— ANI UP/Uttarakhand (@ANINewsUP) January 17, 2018

The police named the owner of the house as Ashok Khatri, who runs a money exchange business. “We received information of the presence of demonetised currency worth crores at a person’s residential premises in Kanpur, and a raid was conducted,” senior police officer AK Meena was quoted by NDTV, adding that they were still counting the recovered currency.

Received information of presence of demonetised currency worth crores at a person's residential premises in Kanpur, raid was conducted, RBI and I-T dept officials informed, final amount not ascertained as search & counting underway, questioning on: AK Meena, SSP, #Kanpur pic.twitter.com/Tqup83cXhj

— ANI UP/Uttarakhand (@ANINewsUP) January 17, 2018

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The Reserve Bank of India and Income Tax officials have also been informed, Meena added. According to the Hindustan Times report, the NIA suspects that the cash was hidden with an intention of converting them into legal currency through illegal means. “We got the information that a huge amount of demonetised currency was being stored in an under-construction house in the Swarup Nagar locality of Kanpur… Since there was no terror angle involved, the information was shared with the Uttar Pradesh police and a joint raid was conducted,” a senior NIA official was quoted by the report, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The NIA had seized over Rs 36 crore in demonetised currency notes in Delhi in November 2017, allegedly linked to the financing of terrorism and separatist activities in Jammu and Kashmir. According to RBI estimates, more than 99 percent of the demonetised notes have returned to the banks. With inputs from agencies