Illegal transaction of money with Pakistan link unearthed in Bihar, 4 held

Lakhisarai, Bihar: Bihar Police has busted a money transaction racket involving withdrawal of money from Indian banks remitted from abroad and then depositing the same in designated accounts on the basis of SMS instructions received from Pakistan mobile numbers, a senior police officer said today. Lakhisarai Superintendent of Police Rajiv Mishra said, on a tip off from NIA, the Bihar Police swung into action and arrested four persons in Lakhisarai district in this connection on Thursday when they turned up at a HDFC bank ATM in an area under Kawaiya police station. Twenty ATM cards and 35 passbooks were recovered from the four identified as Gopal Kumar Goyal, Vikash Kumar, Ganesh Kumar and Pawan Prasad, he said. [caption id=“attachment_1186485” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational Image. AFP[/caption] The unemployed youths, in the age group of 20-25 years, have been remanded to 14 days judicial custody by Chief Judicial Magistrate Amar Jyoti Shrivastava on Friday. The SP said more details were being gathered about the money trail. Deputy Superintendent of Police Subodh Kumar Biswas said that their interrogation revealed that they used to take ATM cards, bank passbooks and cheque books of poor people by paying them Rs 2000. Money used to be transferred into these accounts from abroad.The amounts were then withdrawn and then deposited in designated accounts on SMS instructions over mobile numbers with Pakistan code. The youths used to get 10 percent as commission of the money for their work, the DSP said. Though there was no official confirmation whether the illegal money transaction had any link with the Bodh Gaya and Patna blasts, the DSP said the police were investigating the source of money and recipients of it. The NIA, which has been handed over the investigations of the 7 July bomb blasts in Bodh Gaya and 27 October serial blasts in Patna during Narendra Modi’s rally, is engaged in unravelling the terror network of Indian Mujahideen, which is suspected to be behind the blasts in Bihar. PTI