Punjab police caught 327 drug smugglers in the past week
Darpan News Desk IANS, 23 Aug, 2022 10:55 AM
Chandigarh, Aug 23 (IANS) The Punjab police on Tuesday said it arrested 327 drug smugglers or suppliers after registering 230 first information reports (FIRs) under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act in the state in the last one week.
The police arrested 43 proclaimed offenders and absconders in NDPS Act cases during this period.
Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sukhchain Singh Gill, while addressing his weekly press conference here, said they have recovered 11.73 kg heroin, 20 kg opium, 9 kg ganja, 5.76 quintals of poppy husk, and 28,000 tablets of Pharma opioids, besides recovering Rs 20 lakh drug money after carrying out cordon and search operations in drug-affected areas.
Talking about new trends in drug smuggling, he said the police have tightened the noose around the drug smugglers. Now the drug peddlers and suppliers are adopting new ways to evade arrest by selling drugs in little quantities, in milligrams and grams so that they could not be detected.
"One latest trend has come to fore wherein drug smugglers smuggled drugs by concealing them in onion-loaded trucks to avoid the stink," he added.
Recently, it has also been observed that supply from Abohar and Ferozepur sides is increasing and drug suppliers are now preferring public transport to smuggle drugs, to avoid checking, the IGP said. He added that intoxicant tablets are majorly being supplied from the Uttar Pradesh and Delhi side from Saharanpur, Ghaziabad, Bahadurgarh via Haryana, while opium and poppy husk are mostly coming from Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan side.
Gill said the state police have also waged a war against anti-social elements and gangsters.
The police have busted 67 criminal modules and arrested 301 gangsters, besides neutralizing two dreaded gangsters in an encounter and recovered 640 weapons along with 174 magazines and 3,364 cartridges from their possession.
Besides, the police have recovered seven hand grenades and five IEDs, he added.
The police have also recovered an illegal weapon and live cartridge from the criminal. The accused has been identified as Aakash, a native of Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh.
The Punjab Police informed Delhi Police that the location of one of the phone numbers was traced to Delhi, and that the accused were changing their locations frequently. Acting on the tip-off, Delhi Police followed the leads obtained through technical surveillance and digital footprints.
SSP Mohali, Vivek Sheel Soni said, the two accused identified as Gagandeep Singh alias Gaagi and Gurpreet Singh alias Gopi are residents of Dabbwali in Sirsa district of Haryana.
The Punjab police will take him by a bulletproof car which will be escorted by a dozen cars full of cops. More than 50 police personnel will escort the vehicles to make sure no untoward incident takes place.
Badal said immediately after becoming the Chief Minister, Mann "had not only sublet governance of the state" to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal but had also failed to conduct a thanksgiving tour of his constituency as well as the Sangrur parliamentary seat that had elected him to the Lok Sabha twice.
On Monday, Gandhi was questioned by agency officials for several hours. He was given a lunch break after three hours, and went to meet his mother, and Congress President Sonia Gandhi, who is undergoing treatment at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital.
