AMRITSAR, July 6: With the arrest of two persons — one in Punjab and another in Delhi — and seizure of heroin worth about Rs 60 crore, Punjab Police today claimed to have busted a Pakistan-based drug cartel.
A senior police officer said the duo — a ‘carrier’ and a Delhi-based ‘end-recipient’ — were arrested separately following a week-long operation.
Punjab Police had on June 27 busted another major drug cartel and seized 27-kg heroin in transit from Pakistan to Rajasthan through Jammu and Kashmir.
Punjab Inspector General of Police (Border Zone) Ishwar Chander said they arrested ‘carrier’ Bhajan Singh in Tarn Taran area last evening when he was on his way from Srinagar to Delhi, and seized 12-kg heroin, two Chinese-made .30 bore pistols, two magazines and 12 cartridges from him.
The drug consignment worth about Rs 60 crore in the open market, he said.
Separately, a trap was laid for ‘end-recipient’ Raman Pandit and he was arrested by a team of Punjab Police from near Imperial Cinema in Delhi’s Paharganj area.
The police claimed the consignment was pushed through J&K by international drug smuggler Akram Dayal, based in Muzaffarabad of Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK).
“This is the transit line of a second major Pak-based drug cartel busted by us,” Chander said.
The first cartel led by Lahore-based ‘Kalu Chairman’ and ‘Nasir’ was busted last month. They too were pushing heroin consignments through J&K to Rajasthan, he said.
The Inspector General of Police (IGP) said PoK-based Dayal was contacting ‘carrier’ Singh and ‘end-recipient’ Pandit separately over phone. Pandit was in touch with Dayal for the past five years.
“The Pakistani smugglers were conducting their activities in a cautious manner using ‘cut-offs’ who were not aware about each other, except carrying out telephonic instructions from Pakistan,” the IGP said.
Police said Pandit had been brought to Punjab and was being interrogated. Pandit is a resident of Lok Vihar in Delhi’s Pritampura area and Singh is a resident of Kakkar Kalan village in Amritsar Rural district.
Initial interrogation revealed that the consignment was collected from near the border in Jammu and Kashmir by one Gurjit Singh who was deputed for this purpose by Bhajan Singh.
A police team has been sent to nab Gurjit, the IGP said.
The IGP said Punjab Police have seized a total of 350-kg heroin since 2011. He said consumption of ‘pure heroin’ in Punjab was ‘minimal’.
“There has been a manifold increase in seizure of smack, which was meant for local consumption in Punjab. Consumption of pharmaceutical origin intoxicants was a major problem in the State,” he said.
As against about 61 lakh pills/capsules seized in 2011, over three crores such intoxicants were seized in 2013, he added. (PTI)
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