Lucknow, Nov 22 (IANS): Three persons have been sentenced to five years imprisonment in the fake currency seizure case in which supply of high quality fake Indian currency notes (FICN) were smuggled from Bangladesh, an NIA Special Court said.

The three accused convicted had pleaded guilty before the NIA Special Judge, Lucknow, Dinesh Mishra.

They have been identified as Murad Alam, Tausif Alam and Sariful Islam. All three have been sentenced to five years' rigorous imprisonment.

The case was initially registered by Uttar Pradesh ATS in December 2019, following the recovery of FICN having total face value of Rs 2.49 lakh, from the possession of Mohammad Murad Alam.

The NIA had taken over the investigations after re-registering the case in February 2020.

"Investigation revealed that Murad Alam had received the FICN consignment from Tausif Alam and had carried it for delivery to Shahnawaj Ansari. The consignment was supplied to Tausif Alam by the accused Sariful Islam, who had contacts in Bangladesh from where he used to procure the fake currency," the NIA said.

Further investigations had established that all the accused persons were members of the FICN supply network and the fake currency was purportedly smuggled from across the border.

The accused had conspired to smuggle, sell and procure the FICN, and had kept it in their possession before further circulating and supplying it to persons/consignees in different parts of the country, including Murad Alam, a resident of Ghaziabad, and Shahnawaj Ansari, hailing from Purnea, Bihar, in the case.