JALANDHAR, July 14: Two notorious gangsters, involved in several criminal cases besides arms smuggling from across the Indo-Pak border, were arrested and a cache of several sophisticated weapons was recovered from them, police said Tuesday.
The smuggled arms and ammunition recovered from the arrested duo, Gurpreet Singh alias Gora and Germanjeet Singh, included a bullet-proof jacket, a .455 bore pistol, two Glock 9 mm pistols, one pump-action 12 bore rifle, one .32 bore revolver, one .30 bore pistol and several rounds of live cartridges, said Punjab DGP Dinkar Gupta.
The .455 bore pistol recovered from the duo was provided by another notorious gangster Gopi Ghanshampuriya to them, the state police chief said in a statement.
The duo was arrested by the Jalandhar (Rural) Police from Bhogpur and a car in which they were travelling too was seized, he added.
Senior Superintendent of Police (Jalandhar Rural) Navjot Mahal said the weapons recovered from the duo were packed in a plastic pipe and buried under the ground on a canal bank near Rayyia, Amritsar.
The DGP said Gora was in touch with Pakistan-based illegal arms smugglers and was regularly dealing with them to smuggle in foreign-made weapons to the Indian side.
Gora is facing 14 criminal cases, including those of attempt to murder, assault, snatching, dacoity, gang war and others, in various districts of Punjab, said the DGP, adding he is also a proclaimed offender in 13 of these cases.
During preliminary interrogations, Gora revealed that he was in close contact with Baljinder Singh Billa Mandiala, an accomplice of Pakistan-based drug and arms smugglers, Mirza and Ahmdeen, said Gupta.
Mandiala had received many consignments of weapons and drugs from Mirza and Ahmdeen in the Ferozpur area, the DGP added. (PTI)
He said Pakistani smuggler Mirza has been working as a courier on the Indo-Pak border for Khalistan Liberation Force and had smuggled many arms consignments into the Indian territory.
It has also transpired that a part of five AK-47 consignments, recovered from the Indo-Pak border on September 24, 2019 by the Punjab STF, was meant for this apprehended criminal Billa Mandiala.
Most of the weapons recovered from Billa Mandiala came from Indo-Pak border and police are investigating the role of militants in the supply chain of illegal weapons, he said.
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