Assembly poll: 771 arrests made in 13 days

Gurdeep Singh Mann

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, January 16

Leaving no stone unturned in tightening the noose around anti-social elements, the Bathinda police have made 771 arrests in the past 13 days.

Maximum arrests, 464, were made of those who are expected to have been involved in creating any trouble during or ahead of the Assembly elections.

Police officials said they had identified 471 persons who could be a potential threat to the peaceful election process and might prove instrumental in creating trouble leading to chaos.

The second large number of arrests are made in the cases of the Excise Act, under which 123 arrests have been made after registration of 135 cases across police stations of the city.

Besides the arrests, the police have also recovered 5,354 litres of licit liquor and 159 litres of illicit liquor and 652 kg of lahan.

Police officials said their focus was on the illicit or the licit liquor being hoarded without permission which could possibly be distributed among the poor to entice them to vote in favour of a particular political party. Of the 527 proclaimed offenders (POs), the police have arrested 80 of them and efforts are on to nab more.

The police are also busy in depositing licensed arms and of the total 25,588 arms in the district, so far 93.95 per cent (24,042) are being deposited by the police so far.

The police have also registered 62 cases and made 72 arrests for possessing various forms of habit-forming drugs, including tablets, syrups and intoxicating powder. The police have recovered 1kg of ganja, 750 tablets, 345 gm of heroin, 2 kg of opium, 231 kg of poppy husk, 15,202 tablets, 25 gm of smack, 15 bottles of syrup, 753 gm of narcotic powder, 150 gm of ice and 1.440 kg of ganja.

Besides the arrests of anti-social elements and drug addicts, the police have also executed the 919 non-bailable arrests  and now, 143 such arrests are left which are also being done on a war footing.

The static teams deployed on roads to keep a tab on carrying of cash are yet to catch any violator in this regard.

Police officials had also arrested 32 persons for carrying illegal arms and seized the illegal arms after registering 16 cases.

SSP Swapan Sharma said the police were geared up for the elections and their focus was to keep a watch over the activities of people involved in the distribution of liquor, cash or any other means to influence voters.

He said efforts were on to put such people behind the bar.