Four held in fake stamp haul

Gujarat police on Friday arrested four persons, including a man earlier arrested for his alleged links with Abdul Karim Telgi, the prime accused in the multi-crore stamp paper case, and a government clerk, from here and Vadodara and claimed to have seized fake revenue stamps worth over Rs five lakh.

"Two people were arrested from Vadodara following information derived from interrogation of one of the accused nabbed from Rajkot," state director general of police A K Bhargav said.

Rajkot police commissioner Sanjay Shrivastava said the arrest of Kishore Patel, who was earlier arrested with his wife for alleged links with Telgi, from Rajkot city led to the other arrests and seizures.

He claimed that his interrogation led to arrest of Suresh Soni a clerk in the National Institute of Occupational health in the Meghaninagar area and seizure of fake revenue stamp worth Rs 3,500 from his office.

Shrivastava said Soni's residence in the Nikol area of the city was also searched and more fake revenue stamps were recovered.

On interrogation, he reportedly revealed that he had sent some counterfeit revenue stamps to two persons in Vadodara.

Officials managed to arrest Jignesh Patel and Siddharth Shah and duplicate stamps worth Rs 48,000 were seized from their premises.