5th arrest by NCB in Shaheen Bagh drug haul case, Dubai hawala link found
Darpan News Desk IANS, 02 May, 2022 11:39 AM
New Delhi, May 2 (IANS) The Narcotic Control Bureau has made fifth arrest in the Shaheen Bagh drug haul case where 50 kg pure heroin and narcotics valued at over Rs 100 crore were seized.
Earlier, four persons, including two Afghanistan nationals, were arrested by the NCB. The fifth accused Shamim Ahmad was arrested from from Laxmi Nagar.
"For last two years Shamim had been sending ill-gotten money of drug racket to Dubai through hawala. Every time he used to send Rs 40 to 50 lakh via hawala. Shamim worked as an Aadhti in vegetable market. He came in contact with another arrested accused Haider around two years back and joined the network," sources said.
A person called Shahid controlled the hawala racket of Dubai. Seeing that Shamim had good links with middlemen working in Dubai, Shahid included him in his gang.
On last Thursday, following a tip-off, an NCB team raided the specified locations and recovered 50 kg high quality heroin, 47 kg suspected narcotics, Rs 30 lakh in cash, cash counting machines and other incriminating material. The contraband was stored inside bag packs and jute sacks.
"The seized heroin originated in Afghanistan and the drug money is suspected to be channelled through hawala. The seized contraband was packed inside an online shopping store packets," the official had said.
"During investigation, it was revealed that an Indo-Afghan syndicate based in Delhi/NCR or the neighbouring states, seemed to be connected to the case. These syndicates had expertise in manufacturing heroin locally," NCB Deputy Director General (Operations), Sanjay Kumar Singh had said on Thursday.
According to him, these syndicates have been smuggling contraband into India through maritime as well as land border routes.
"Heroin was smuggled in with various legitimate goods and was later extracted from those goods by the Indian counterparts with the help of some Afghan nationals," the DDG had claimed.
Several raids have been conducted since Thursday and some are still going on to bust the entire network.
The syndicate was found to be connected to drug traffickers in the entire north India including Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Delhi.
Punjab is predominantly an agricultural state with majority of population living in rural areas. Forty-five per cent of total diesel consumed in Punjab is used in agriculture, 25 per cent in transportation, 20 per cent in industry and 10 per cent by retail consumer.
Delhi Police on Wednesday busted a smuggling racket of imported cigarettes and recovered 3,650 packets of illegally smuggled cigarettes, valued at approximately Rs 7.3 lakhs. According to the police, a man, identified as Aamir Laeeq, 30, was arrested in this connection.
Security guards in all the banks in J&K are provided with point 12 bore shotguns and not rifles. While bullets are used in rifles, the ammunition of a shotgun is made of cartridges.
The haul is valued at nearly Rs 8 lakh. The smuggler Abdul Baki Malitha (40) and the silver pellets have been handed over to the Customs department at Jalangi, Murshidabad, for further processing.
The sources also said that they have identified around 22 mobile numbers of PFI student wing members who were present in the area before the violence erupted. They said that the probe agencies have been trying to ascertain their activities and they may be questioned by the Crime Branch of the Delhi Police.
The packet had come through the cargo to Sirajudeen on April 17, and on Monday a person named Naukul had come to take it. The officials used a gas cutter to open the meat slicer and recovered 2.26 kg of gold stacked inside the machine.
