Chandigarh, April 18 (IANS) Punjab Police have solved the hand-grenade attack at Crime Investigation Agency (CIA) office in Nawanshahr by busting a major Pakistan-based terror module run by Harvinder Singh, alias Rinda, with the arrest of its three operatives, said Director General of Police V.K. Bhawra here on Monday.
Some persons on the night of November 7 and 8, 2021, had hurled a hand grenade with the intention to kill police officials. However, the officials present there had escaped unhurt.
Those arrested have been identified as Manish Kumar, a resident of village Bains in Nawanshahr, Ramandeep Singh of Jalandhar district and Pardeep Singh in SBS Nagar district. The police have also recovered one hand grenade from their possession.
Bhawra said after extensive and sustained investigation, the Counter Intelligence wing and the SBS Nagar police have arrested three accused.
During interrogation, Ramandeep confessed that he along with Manish had thrown the hand grenade on the directions of Harvinder Singh, said the DGP, while adding that Ramandeep had picked-up two hand grenades from the Ludhiana-Ferozepur Road as guided by Rinda.
Sandeep Kumar, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) SBS Nagar, said while one han grenade was used for the attack in Nawanshahr, another P-80 hand grenade, similar to the one used to carry out the attack, was recovered on the disclosure of Ramandeep. Harvinder struck a deal with Ramandeep for Rs 4 lakh to carry out this attack, he added.
Harvinder Singh, a notorious gangster active in Punjab, Chandigarh, Maharashtra and Haryana, is a history-sheeter and wanted by Punjab Police in heinous crimes, including murder, contract killing, robbery, extortion and snatching.
The incident took place at Kusupur village in the state's Cuttack district. Accused Shiba Prasad Sahoo (42) confessed to the crime through a video message and sent it to his village sarpanch and few others. He later surrendered before Balichandrapur police in Jajpur district.
According to a source, the meeting continued for two hours around and both CMs discussed how to give free 300 units of electricity in Punjab - as promised by the party in its election campaign.
The Left alliance members accused the ABVP of forcefully imposing a ban on non vegetarian food at the Kaveri Hostel in the campus while the ABVP alleged that the members of the Left alliance including the NSUI were not allowing them to conduct a Pooja and Havan programme on the occasion of Ram Navami.
Two people were declared dead and several others injured after two cable cars in a ropeway collided with each other at the Trikut hills close to Baba Baidyanath Temple in Deoghar on Sunday.
On April 4, the Force seized over two kg of contrabands suspected to be heroin, while on January 12, 6.3 kilograms heroin and one pistol, one magazine and 50 rounds were recovered.
The crime data indicates that 158 murders have taken place in the state this year in almost 100 days making an average of 50 murders per month, while in previous years, the number of murders was 724 and 757 in 2021 and 2020, respectively, making the monthly average of murders for 2021 and 2020 was 60 and 65 murders respectively.
