Meet Aftab Batki, the notorious fake currency runner eluding India

Dawood Ibrahim's gold toothed aide continues to be a threat to India's economic stability

The arrest of Abdul Salam, an accused in a high profile trans-border fake currency cases on December 22, 2016 after he was deported by Saudi Arabia helped the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in bringing him to trial. But the key man in this case, one of the major irritants in India’s fight against fake currency still remains an elusive catch for investigative agencies.  

The man in question is Aftab Batki, a Mumbai resident and considered a key aide of gangster Dawood Ibrahim. The NIA suspects Batki to be sheltered in Pakistan.  Batki is also the only one who continues to be absconding in this case.  

The NIA which has taken on a number of Fake Indian Currency Note (FICN) smuggling cases after the Modi government came to power is yet to completely comprehend Batki’s modus operandi. The agency’s chargesheet in the Abdul Salam case shows that India may have little control when it comes to tackling the flow of fake rupee notes outside its borders before they enter India.

In this case dating back to late 2013, a man with almost Rs 10 lakh in fake Rs 500 notes was arrested at the Kochi International Airport by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI). The police carried out initial investigations before the NIA took over in June 2014. The NIA’s chargesheet mentions that Aftab Batki was in Pakistan when he arranged the fake currency which were then transported to Dubai. It also acknowledges that Batki actively deals with the “fake currency business of the Dawood Ibrahim gang.”

But NIA’s investigating officers were clueless about how money moved around before entering India. The chargesheet simply mentions that the fake currency was printed in Pakistan with the active involvement of Dawood’s syndicate and Batki was instrumental in smuggling them to Dubai. The Dubai route has been a favourite for fake currency smugglers for many years.

Batki is involved in several of these cases. But India’s ground intelligence over the years has been unable to crack this nexus or plug the routes that allow for easy smuggling of currency printed in Pakistan to Gulf nations.

In fact a reading of NIA charge sheet pertaining to FICN cases – be it Malda in West Bengal or national capital Delhi – shows the agency invariably drawing a Pakistani link without submitting concrete evidence of the same. Most of the accused are invariably questioned in custody and are money runners who have little clue of the masterminds behind the printing and transport of currency.  

Batki, like Dawood continues to remain elusive even though the Interpol had issued a red corner notice against him in 2001.

 What will help investigators is that they will soon get the custody of Abdullah Haji, another prized counterfeiter currently under detention in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Like Batki, Haji also pushed fake currency through the Dubai route into India. His links to Dawood’s syndicate is not clear.

Haji is named as an accused in a 2015 chargesheet filed by the NIA before a special court in Kochi for allegedly smuggling more than Rs 24 lakh in fake notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 denomination.

According to the latest list of deportations released by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in December 2016, Haji is yet to be deported to India despite UAE having agreed for his extradition in 2015.

While the government’s demonetisation move has managed to blunt the strategies of men like Aftab Batki, it may not be long before cross border counterfeiters are back to their old ways again.