Members of a bomb disposal squad inspect the bag at Paltan Bazar in Guwahati on Saturday. (PTI)

Guwahati, Jan. 3: The recovery of “black dollars” from Paltan Bazar has fuelled suspicion about the presence of a black dollar racket in the city.

Police yesterday found 17 bundles of black papers neatly arranged and embossed with design similar to the one found on US dollars, inside the chest of an unclaimed travel bag. Each bundle contained 100 black papers each of the size of a dollar.

A chemical solution and an instruction manual containing charts and diagrams detailing the procedure to make “US dollars” were found inside. Inscribed on the manual were the words: “Federal Reserve Bank of the United States”.

The manual reads that if the solution is applied on any of the black notes, it will turn into a US dollar.

According to a police source, a few genuine dollars, also coated with a black substance, are kept with the stack of papers.

The source said that the bag could belong to a member of the black dollar racket and investigations were on.

The racketeers approached the gullible ones with the black papers, he said.

According to the source, the cheats, while giving a demonstration, pick the genuine dollars coated with a black substance and put these into a “secret chemical substance” that remove the black paint to convince their victims that the other black papers too are original.

“They are told that the whole bunch can be washed with the solution. After the substance is bought by shelling out a huge sum, the criminal will give them instructions for its use and thus dupe them,” he added.

Many fall prey to these racketeers because they offer the “black dollars” at prices much lower than the prevailing conversion rates.

The police recovered the unclaimed bag when an onlooker raised the alarm at the Assam State Transport Corporation’s (ASTC) bus stand at Paltan Bazar yesterday afternoon.

“When we opened the bag, a safe with digital lock system was found inside,” the police source said. The police broke open the safe.

He said the a cautionary note in the manual said the bottle containing the chemical solution should not be opened without wearing a mask and gloves as exposure to the liquid could cause blood or lung cancer.

With no explosive found inside the bag, the police initially heaved a sigh of relief but soon were left wondering who could have brought the “black dollars” and for what purpose.

“We are investigating into it but a breakthrough is yet to be made. Samples of the seized materials will be sent to the Reserve Bank of India and the Forensic Science Laboratory for examination,” the police source said.

“We have also activated our sources to track down if any member of the gang is in the city,” he said.

“Several cases of cheating by the black dollar rackets have come to light in different places of the country in recent past and several members of these gangs were arrested by the police and CBI sleuths. Most of those arrested are foreign nationals, mostly Nigerians,” he added.