BJP neta, who championed demonetisation, held with fake currency

The irony of it all! While Prime Minister Narendra Modi had grandly announced that removing “counterfeit currency” was one of the main aims of his demonetisation drive, one of his party’s youth wing leader in Kerala was allegedly doing just that—running a fake currency racket.

Rakesh Ezhacherry, a Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) leader, was arrested on Thursday for running a fake currency racket from Kerala’s Thrissur district. Police recovered counterfeit currency worth ₹1,37,590 lakh from Rakesh’s residence, a printing machine, ink used to print the counterfeit notes and a laptop from his home during a raid.

In fact, Ezhacherry was prominently featured in a poster with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah in an awareness campaign against “black money” in January this year. BJP state general secretary Shobha Surendran was apparently leading the pracharana yatra (an awareness rally).

However, from what the police revealed, Ezhacherry was apparently busy printing the new denomination of currencies.

Speaking to National Herald, Superintendent of Police-Thrissur (Rural) N Vijayakumar said, “Based on inputs, we raided his house as part of an anti-money laundering drive. But, we found that he was running a fake currency racket. We seized 55 notes of ₹2,000 and 14 notes of ₹500.”

Rakesh’s brother, Rajiv, is said to be absconding after the raid and police say that he is said to be somewhere near Thiruvananthapuram. The senior police official claimed that he would “soon” be arrested.

Local media reported that the BJP leader and his brother used to exchange fake currency in local shops and petrol pumps. Police claimed that their activities were under observation for some time.