Three more arrested for selling blank papers as USD

PUNE: The Kondhwa police on Saturday arrested three more people for duping two Hadapsar-based businessmen of Rs 2 lakh by selling them fake US dollars.Mohammad Shaikh (37), Mohammad Khan (34) and Dilawar Khan (25), all from West Bengal, were arrested for duping businessman Govind Sandipan Dole and his partner Sachin Lote from Hadapsar. Wahid Abu Shaikh (25) and Abdul Rehman Jaffar Shaikh (22), also from West Bengal, were arrested on Thursday. Senior inspector Satish Govekar, incharge of Kondhwa police station, said, "We suspect that two or three groups, with women as members, are duping businessmen in the city by luring them into buying wads of blank papers as US dollars. The groups have, so far, transferred the money thus earned to West Bengal.""We are interrogating the five men to find out the number of crimes committed by them in Pune," Govekar added.On September 20, one of the conmen visited Dole seeking change for Rs 500. Dole avoided him, but the conman showed him a $20 bill and sought his help in exchanging the note for Indian currency. He left the note with Dole and promised to get in touch with him. Later, the trickster called Dole and told him that he had 1,672 notes of the same denomination, worth Rs 21 lakh. Dole and Lote agreed to meet the conmen behind Bhairavnath temple in Kondhwa. There, they saw the notes and the conman said he wanted Rs 5 lakh because he had to pay the medical bills of a relative. On October 2, Dole met the conmen and after negotiations he agreed to exchange the dollar bills for Rs 2 lakh. After two days, both the conmen collected the money from Dole and handed him a bag containing a box and fled. When they opened it, Dole and Lote came to know they have been cheated. Havaldar Rajas Shaikh received a tip-off that the conmen were in Kondhwa to meet another businessman. A police team laid a trap and arrested Wahid and Abdul. During interrogation, they confessed to cheating Dole, who has registered a cheating complaint with the Kondhwa police station.