Between 1992 and 2002, more than 25 cases were registered against Telgi. But with the help of top officials, he survived till 2001. He was finally arrested in November 2000.
Last year’s web series Scam 1992 – The Harshad Mehta was a huge hit. After the success of this webseries, director Hansal Mehta decided to make a webseries on the person named Abdul Karim Telgi, who was once a fan of grain, but after becoming a mafia, he did a scam of 20 thousand crores. Which was called the first biggest scam of independent India and came to be known as fake stamp scam. Let us know the full story of Abdul Karim Telgi, how he started this business and accumulated a lot of wealth.
Abdul Karim Telgi was born in Khanapur, Karnataka. His father worked in the Indian Railways. When Telgi was young, his father died. After the death of his father, Telgi had to be infatuated with grain. To fill his stomach, Telgi along with his family members had to sell groundnuts at the station. Later he got his B.Com degree from Belagavi in Karnataka and went to Mumbai. After staying for a few days in Mumbai, he went to Saudi Arabia to earn money.
Later, on his return to Mumbai from Saudi Arabia, he started the business of selling fake certificates. Along with this, he also started making fake passports and through this he started sending people to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. During this, the eyes of the Immigration Department fell on him. He was later put in a jail in Mumbai for making fake passports. While in jail, Telgi met Ram Ratan Soni, a stamp business owner in Kolkata.
It was Soni who gave him the idea to sell stamps on a large scale. After this, in the year 1994, Telgi, working with Sony, obtained a license to become a legal stamp seller. Together with the help of this license, both of them earned lakhs by selling many fake stamp papers along with the original stamp papers. With this money, Telgi also started many other businesses. Later, there was a rift between Telgi and Soni and both of them parted ways. At the same time, the police also canceled his license to sell stamps.
After the cancellation of the license, Telgi made up his mind to open his own press. However, his motive was still to sell fake stamps. For this, Telgi, using his contacts, declared the government stamp making machine useless and bought it. With the help of the same machine, he started printing fake stamps and selling them in many cities. During this, Telgi also hired many big degree holder students. Who used to help Telgi in his fake stamp business.
Between 1992 and 2002, more than 25 cases were registered against Telgi. But with the help of top officials, he survived till 2001. He was finally arrested in November 2000. His arrest came after two men who sold fake stamp papers were caught in Bangalore in 2000. The scam was exposed by the arrest of both of them. After his arrest, when the police interrogated Telgi, the names of many big leaders and police officers came to the fore. Eventually the CBI started its own investigation into the matter. In the investigation, 36 properties of Telgi were unearthed and more than 100 bank accounts were found in 18 cities. The cost of this scam was estimated to be around 20,000 crores.
Telgi and his associates were later sentenced in 2006 to 30 years of imprisonment and a fine of Rs 202 crore by the court. During this he was kept in Bangalore Jail. He lived a very luxurious life even in jail. In July 2017, DIG (Prisons) of Bangalore D. Roopa revealed that Telgi is given special treatment in jail and three or four people are given massages, there was a lot of sensation. He later died on 26 October 2017. According to doctors, Telgi was suffering from diabetes and high blood pressure. Due to these diseases many of his organs stopped working and he died.