Lakhisarai, Nov. 18: Jailed woman kingpin of an illegal money transaction racket with a Pakistan link and her husband were today sent to two-day police remand by a district court here.
Granting the police prayer, chief judicial magistrate Amar Jyoti Shrivastava also sent Gopal Goel and Pawan Kumar, arrested earlier in connection with the case, to police remand for the same period.
The racket was busted on the basis of an alert by National Investigation Agency (NIA), which is probing the serial blasts in Patna and Bodhgaya.
A team of Bihar police had arrested Ayesha Bano and her husband Zubair Hussain, who runs a bidi business, from Mangalore on November 12 and they were brought here on transit remand for investigating the illegal money trail.
The couple were arrested from Mangalore in Karnataka and was remanded in 14 days’ judicial custody on Saturday.They were remanded in 14 days’ judicial custody by the court on Saturday. Ayesha Bano, a mother of three, was referred to as “Pakistan boss” by those in the racket.
Preliminary inquiry revealed that she was handled from Pakistan and used to instruct agents here to deposit money in designated bank accounts.
Four persons allegedly used to lure poor people to open the bank accounts by paying them Rs 2,000 each. Money poured into these bank accounts from unknown destinations, mostly abroad, thereafter.
Instructions used to be sent through SMS from Pakistan to withdraw cash from these accounts and deposit them in other accounts. The four were arrested from near a private bank ATM here on November 8 and sent to Lakhisarai jail.
The police said 25 ATM cards, 35 passbooks and cheques were seized from them. A few days back, director-general of police (DGP) Abhayanand said: “We have decided to seek the Interpol’s help to ascertain the involvement of some Pakistani nationals in hawala transactions. Their involvement has been established on the basis of calls made from Pakistan to their Lakhisarai-based agents.”
Sources said at least 39 calls were made from Pakistan on the cellphone of one of the four persons arrested in Lakhisarai. The agents were in touch with Ayesha and some Pakistani nationals, who deposited money in their bank accounts. The money was subtransferred through real time gross settlement (RTGS).
