Duo held in Palghar with 3 AK-47s

The lethal AK-47 is infamous for being the preferred assault rifle of terrorists; three such weapons were seized on Sunday in Palghar, Mumbai’s backyard.

A weapon of Soviet lineage, which the Russians stopped supplying some time back, the assault rifle or its variant is used only by Indian defence personnel.

The Palghar seizure came on a tip-off; the police also arrested two persons in Manor who were carrying the deadly consignment in a gunny bag. A huge cache of small fire arms and contraband worth Rs 14 crore was also recovered. (Recently, there were unconfirmed reports of drones dropping AK-47s in Punjab.)

According to the police, these rifles might be replicas. Even then, the fact that such weapons can be replicated and easily fall into the hands of non-state actors is scary.

The Palghar police had received information about some people coming to Manor with a stash of weapons and drugs. Working on this information the Manor Police and the local crime branch laid a trap in Hindustan Dhaba, Maujje Chilhar Fata. Around 6pm on Sunday, the police detained two persons with a big plastic gunny-bag. When the gunnybag was opened, the police were shocked to find three AK-47s with magazines.

Apart from the rifles, the police recovered four country-made pistols, revolvers, 63 live cartridges, 9kg of ephedrine, 8.5kg of the drug DMT, 500gm brown sugar and 4kg of dodo morphine, valued at Rs 13.61 crore, and Rs 80 lakh in cash.

The police are yet to disclose the identities of the arrested accused and some more arrests are likely in the coming days. According to the police, the AK-47s were likely to be country-made and some parts of the rifles were found missing.

The police are yet to ascertain if the AK-47s were being transported for terror activities; it is also still to verify if the drug money was meant to be used for the upcoming elections in Maharashtra.