No kidding: ATM spews out ‘Children Bank’ `2,000 notes
NEW DELHI: A State Bank of India ATM in south Delhi’s Sangam Vihar dispensed fake `2,000 notes, which appeared genuine at first glance but a closer look revealed a wealth of deliberate errors that suggested the hand of a hopeless prank.
A customer care executive of a call centre in Chhatarpur became the prankster’s victim when he withdrew `8,000 — in denominations of 2,000 — from the SBI ATM on February 6 and found to his horror that four bills were issued by the “Children Bank of India” and “Bharatiya Manoranjan Bank”. Not the Reserve Bank of India, which is the issuing authority of cash in the country.
Furthermore, the notes carried obvious deviations such as “Guaranteed by the Children’s Government” in place of “Guaranteed by the Central Government”, “Churan lable” instead of the latent image, and a ‘PK’ logo took the place of the RBI seal.
The mistakes appeared deliberate as the notes “promise to pay the bearer two thousand coupons” and bore “serial number 000000”.
The man, identified as Rohith, called the police helpline and subinspector Saurabh Kumar, who arrived to help, tried to ascertain the mischief with his own debit card. He withdrew
`2,000 and a similar fake note came out of the machine.
The ATM was temporarily sealed thereafter and a case was registered.
Investigators suspect the entire incident was a prank.
“Our probe revealed that the noteswerenotcounterfeit.Theyare similar to children’s toy money sold at toyshops,” deputy commissioner of police Romil Baaniya said.
The SBI accused Mohd Isha, an employeeof logisticsandcashmanagementcompanyBrinksIndiaPvt Ltd, for the trouble.
He has been asked to join the probe, but not arrested.
“Hewasthesolecustodianof the vault that contained these notes. So for now the focus is on him,” Baaniya said.
The private company was contracted to deliver cash at SBI ATMs across the national capital.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 SPOT THE DIFFERENCE >>P3