194kg heroin seized from house in Amritsar, 7 held
CRACKDOWN CONTINUES Agencies claim a bulk of the rising demand of contraband in neighbouring HP, Haryana being met through supplies from Punjab
AMRITSAR: Unearthing a major heroin supply racket having overseas connections, Punjab Police’s special task force (STF) recovered 194kg heroin from a house in Sultanwind area of Amritsar. Police have arrested seven people, including the owner of the house, a 24-year-old woman and a Afghan national.
The operation was carried out on the disclosure of one Sukhbir Singh alias Happy, who was arrested with 6kg heroin. The kingpin has been identified as Ankush Kapoor, who runs a cloth store on Queens Road here. The accused have been booked under Sections 21/61/85 of NDPS Act and 25/54/59 of the Arms Act at Special Task Force police station in SAS Nagar. Another FIR was registered on Thursday.
Other accused have been identified as Sukhwinder Singh of Naushehra Khurd village of Amritsar district, Major Singh, Tamanna Gupta, Arman Basharmal of Afghanistan and the house owner Anwar Masih.
During the raid at the house, 188.4kg heroin was recovered in the presence of an executive magistrate, said Harpreet Singh Sidhu, ADGP, STF, Punjab, at a press briefing here.
“Besides heroin, suspected 38.2kg dextromethorphan and 25.9kg caffeine powder, along with six drums of chemicals, were recovered from the house. Afghan national has been identified as Arman Basharmal,” Sidhu said.
“The woman was arrested from the house itself. However, her role is yet to be ascertained,” said the ADGP. “The processing of the heroin at the house started about a month ago,” said IGP, STF, Kaustubh Sharma.
The Afghan national had travelled to India recently and was helping the kingpin in processing the contraband. A gas burner, commercial cylinders and utensils of steel and aluminium were also found at the place, police said. The accused would adulterate the heroin with other ingredients to increase its volume for more gains, police said.
Meanwhile, police said Ankush Kapoor worked in tandem with Simranjit Singh Sandhu, who stays in Italy. Currently a proclaimed offender (PO) in a case registered by Gujarat police in connection with 300kg heroin haul, he was arrested by the Interpol after a red corner notice was issued by Gujarat Police.
HOUSE OWNER WAS SSS BOARD MEMBER
House owner Anwar Masih is a former member of the Subordinate Selection Service Board (SSSB) and a local SAD leader. “Today is the first day of the investigation in the case. We will investigate the role of the owner and act accordingly,” police said.
Speaking to the media, Anwar said, “I was in the process of selling off the house when rented it out to Sukhwinder a month ago. I had no idea that it will be misused for such activities.” Gurpartap Singh Tikka, city president of the SAD, said, “Anwar was active in the party till last assembly elections but not now.” However, Anwar associates himself with the SAD on his Facebook page.
HOUSE OWNER, AN AFGHAN NATIONAL AND A 24-YEAR-OLD WOMAN AMONG THOSE ARRESTED
CHANDIGARH: Punjab continues to be a preferred destination as well as a transit route for heroin smugglers who have been adopting innovative means to push drugs into the state despite the Captain Amarinder Singh-led Congress government’s claims of an all-out crackdown on the menace.
The seizure of 194kg heroin and chemicals in the Sultanwind area of Amritsar city early Friday is the second major contraband haul in the last seven months, with the first being recovery of 532kg heroin by the customs department at the integrated checkpost (ICP) at Attari.
The seizure is the biggest by the Punjab Police since 2014.
The police’s special task force (STF) against drugs, which carried out the operation, suspects that the contraband might have come from Pakistan via the sea route from Gujarat and was brought to Amritsar in trucks carrying cumin seeds.
The Attari consignment was smuggled in rock salt bags.
“Punjab has been a transit route for heroin since long. But it continues to remain the market for its consumption as well. This is the reason as why the smugglers glers are taking the risk of sneaking big consignments into the state not through the traditional route of the international border along Pakistan but via Gujarat and then transporting it by road,” a senior STF official said.
Officials say the demand of heroin has increased multi-fold in the neighbouring Himachal Pradesh and Haryana and the 90% of their demand is met through supplies from Punjab.
Such is the desperation of smugglers to push drugs into Punjab that the police recently busted a module that was using drones for transporting heroin into Punjab.
Also, there are reports of drugs coming to Punjab from Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir besides
Myanmar.
At a press conference on Friday’s drug haul, chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh said the rate of heroin in the market has increased sharply in the past two years due to cut in the supply chain. “Unfortunately, Punjab, along with Delhi, emerged as a lucrative market for drugs over the years, encouraging smugfrom other states and narcoterrorists from Pakistan to push contraband into the state. Our government has been working closely with other northern states by sharing regular information to combat the problem. This is why we have been able to make large recoveries in the past couple of years,” claimed the CM.
The Punjab Police seized 1,294 kg heroin since March 2017 when the Congress came to power in comparison to the recovery of 1,094kg of the contraband during the Shiromani Akali Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party (SAD-BJP) government’s second consecutive tenure from 2012 to 2017.
WHY GUJARAT ROUTE?
Senior police officials say smugglers are now opting for the Gujarat route since the Border Security Force (BSF) has also increased vigil along the Punjab border with Pakistan. Also, the inputs by state intelligence agencies and the Narcotics Crime Bureau (NCB) have helped tighten the grip over peddlers in the past couple of years.
While the deployment of senior officials at the BSF’s Punjab frontier headquarters in Jalandhar has increased, the NCB, a central agency to check drug abuse, for the first time has posted a team comprising 9-10 personnel that will be headed by a deputy director general-rank officer, followed by a zonal director, two deputy directors, superintendents and intelligence officers, especially on the request of CM Amarinder.
“Since the risk of getting caught at the border has increased and there is a pressure on Pakistan-based smugglers to pump in more heroin because of bumper crop of poppy husk in Afghanistan, desperate attempts are being made to maintain the sale by different means. This is why the biggest seizures made in the country in the past couple of years have come via Gujarat,” said an intelligence official.
› The heroin was seized in the presence of an executive magistrate. Also, suspected caffeine powder and dextromethorphan were found. An Afghan man is among those held. HARPREET SINGH SIDHU, ADGP, STF, PUNJAB