The Mumbai Police’s crime branch unit 3 intercepted a tempo in Lower Parel and seized fake N-95 and V-410 V masks, which were being sold as branded masks, worth ₹21.39 lakh and arrested a 42-year-old trader under the Essential Commodities Act on Wednesday.
The arrested accused, Safdar Hussain Mohammad Jafar Momin, owns a godown in Bhiwandi, and as per preliminary inquiry, it appears that he brought duplicate masks from Delhi and sold to local wholesalers in Thane and Mumbai.
Following a tip-off, a police team laid a trap near Poddar compound in Lower Parel and nabbed the accused when he came to deliver duplicate and low-quality of masks to a wholesaler in the area.
“During search we found 10,500 N-95 and 6,800 V-410 V masks worth ₹21.39 lakh inside the tempo. An FIR was registered in the NM Joshi Marg police station against the accused,” said police inspector Nitin Patil of unit 3. The police team also raided Momin’s godown and found PPE kit.
As per inquiry, these low-quality N-95 and V-410-V masks are being manufactured in Delhi and then supplied to Mumbai. Momin has been selling these masks for three months claiming these were originals. He had bought the masks in bulk and stored them in his godown.
He has been supplying face masks to medical stores and others without any license, said deputy commissioner of police Akbar Pathan of crime branch. Momin was produced in the court and remanded in police custody till August 3.
After the lockdown was declared the Mumbai crime branch seized around 32.58 lakh masks worth ₹17.30 crore from different parts of the city in March and April month. The government has declared face masks and hand sanitisers as essential commodities to ensure that there is no scarcity of these two items and they are priced correctly. Under the EC Act, the government has declared that investigating agencies can carry out operations against those involved in the black marketing of masks and hand sanitisers.
