Two jawans held with fake notes worth Rs 1.7 lakh

Two jawans of the Territorial Army, posted in the frontier Poonch district, were arrested by the Jammu and Kashmir Police after fake currency worth Rs 1.7 lakh was recovered from them.

The jawans have been identified as Mohd Aslam and Inayat Hussain of village Kalai in Poonch.

Recovery of fake currency notes from the custody of two jawans of the Territorial Army has raised serious question marks over the penetration of Pakistani intelligence within the Indian armed forces and the police have started investigations to track down the channel of the counterfeit currency notes.

Both the jawans were recruited in the TA battalion more than five years ago and were attached with 27 Rashtriya Rifles, the police said.

After the arrest of these two jawans, a group of Army jawans of 17 Rajput led by two senior Army officers of the Major rank clashed with the Station House Officer (SHO) of Poonch police station Kuldeep Khajuria inside the Army camp in Poonch on Monday.

SHO of Poonch Kuldeep Khajuria says that after the arrest of two jawans of TA Battalion he had sent a police party to pick another suspect named by the TA jawans during preliminary investigations to Malti general area near the Line of Control (LoC) on Monday morning.

"I received a message from local Armymen claiming that the Commanding Officer of 17 Rajput wanted to see me near Michale Gate in the Army camp," Khajuria said. "When I reached the Army camp my PSOs were told to stay near the gate and I was escorted inside the office of the commanding officer," he added.

Khajuria alleged, "as soon as I entered the office of the CO I found more than 8-9 Armymen, including two senior officers of Major rank present inside the office but the CO was not present. Without wasting any time the Armymen thrashed me which led to a scuffle between all of us. When I raised an alarm and managed to come out of the room my PSOs reacted and sent a flash message to the district headquarters." After some time when senior Army officers and police officers arrived on the scene unruly Army jawans were found handling their weapons. Khajuria alleged the Armymen opened fire as well to scare away policemen present at the spot.

According to the police, an FIR against the senior Army officers and their jawans was lodged in the Poonch police station and charges under Section 307, 332, 342 and 147 have been slapped against them. A separate FIR over recovery of fake currency under Section 489-B and 109 was also filed and they have been booked to further carry out the investigations in the case, the police said.

Ministry of Defence spokesman in Jammu Lt Col Biplab Nath when contacted maintained he was not aware whether any clash took place between Armymen and the local police and was not in a position to offer any comments. He, however, added two Territorial Army jawans were arrested by police after currency notes worth Rs 1.7 lakh was recovered from their custody.