Hyderabad: Demonetized Brazilian currencies like the Cruzeiro and Cruzado, are being circulated in Hyderabad black markets with the help of Latin America’s drug cartels. In seven cases busted by the police recently, it has come to light that the cash came from agents based in Chennai and Mumbai. Local agents tell prospective buyers about the cheap price of the currency hiding the fact that it is no longer valid.
Police officials said the demonetized Brazilian currency being sold in India by scamsters is a new phenomenon. It surfaced after the South American cartels found ways to deliver drugs to southeast Asia. As per media reports, the cartels started smuggling drugs to Bangladesh and Bangkok by sea in the second half of 2015. “A large quantity of outdated Brazilian currency is in circulation now in the city and other parts of Telangana and AP. This shows that the currency must have reached India in bulk via the sea route. The cash is now slowly surfacing,” said inspector L. Raja Venkat Reddy, of the Commissioner’s Task Force whose team busted a racket.
The city police hasn’t got to the bottom of the Brazilian currency scam yet. “We could only arrest the local agents, who are trying to circulate the money in the market. The kingpins of this scam are still at large,” said another task force official. When Panjagutta police busted the gang with 490 notes of 1,000-Cruzado denomination, they found that the local agents got the cash from a Mumbai agent, who is still absconding.
It is suspected that gangs based in Latin America ship the outdated cash to Asia after being convinced by their local counterparts that India and Bangladesh are the easiest targets to dispose of the currency. Similar scams had recently occurred in Bengaluru, Chennai, and Mumbai.
