Schoolboys arrested with forged currency notes in Digana

By Shane Seneviratne

A group of schoolboys who had in their possession 57 forged currency notes of Rs.5,000 denomination were arrested yesterday by Theldeniya Police.

The four students were arrested on information received from a trader in Digana area. They had attempted to change a forged currency note by purchasing goods. The suspect schoolboys were between 15 and 17 years of age.

During investigations, the police seized 57 forged currency notes which the suspects had in their possession. Under interrogation, they stated that they received the forged currency notes from an individual known to them to purchase anything they wanted.

Investigations revealed that he had fled from the area to evade arrest when the four boys were arrested.

Meanwhile, a senior police official said the currency notes had been printed for a scene of a film shot in Digana area, but without obtaining permission from the Central Bank. He said the currency notes printed for such purposes should be clearly marked as duplicates and handed over to the Central Bank after shooting the scene.

He said the Director and the Art Director of the film were taken into custody during investigations. They were residents of Kandy and Pilimathalawa who had produced a film in 2021, and they had used forged currency notes for one of the scenes.

The four schoolboys, the Director and the Art Director of the film were produced before Theldeniya Magistrate who released the schoolboys on personal bail of Rs,500,000 each and remanded the other two suspects till December 30.

HQI Theldeniya Police CI Ravindra Senadeera is conducting further investigations on the instructions of SSP Roshan Amarasinghe.