Mumbai: With the Coronavirus increasing day-to-day, and with the big demand for Masks, some people are taking negative advantage of it and are storing them in Godowns to sell it in black.

The Mumbai Crime Branch Unit 9 on receiving information about masks being sold in black in godown in Andheri and Bhiwandi raided the Godowns and seized a major cache of 25 lakh high-quality face masks including 3 lakh N95 Masks totally worth Rs.15 crore on Monday evening.

Four men have been arrested four in this mask black- marketing business under the essential commodity Act. Two are absconding.

The arrested accused have been identified as Balaji Muttupandi Nadar, Shahrukh Akhil Shaikh, Mihir Darshan Patel and Gulam Murtuza Munshir. Nadar is an operator and Patel is a custom housing agent while Shaikh and Munshir are godown owners.

The accused were selling 3 ply face mask for Rs 20 in the black market which costs Rs 2. While N-95 mask is priced at around Rs 100 and the accused involved were selling at around Rs 300 in the market.

The accused allegedly were planning to export the face masks despite a strict government circular banning exports of face masks due to the Covid 19 pandemic.

The raids were conducted under the supervision of DCP Akbar Pathan from the Mumbai crime branch.

News Edit by KVRaman

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