Police bust Rs 14L hawala racket, probe drug smuggling module

Tribune News Service

PK Jaiswar

Amritsar, November 20

Police have busted a well oiled hawala racket involved in making payments for drugs. The police also seized Rs 14.55 lakh of drug money from nine persons arrested during the 10-day probe.

Among those arrested are two Patiala-based hawala agents besides two Kapurthala residents who were arrested following a brief exchange of fire.

Amritsar Rural SSP Satinder Singh informed that the police had arrested Baldev Singh of Kakkar Kalan village along with Gurjant Singh of Nathupura village and recovered Rs 20,800 of drug money from their possession on November 11. During interrogation, they told the police that they had delivered heroin and drug money to Tanvir Singh of Chheharta recently. Tanvir was nabbed on November 15 and the police seized 110 gm of heroin along with Rs 2.75 lakh of drug money from him.

Tanvir’s interrogation led the police to the two Patiala-based hawala agents, Sandeep Singh of Pathan Majra village and Jaswant Singh of Nupur village. They were subsequently arrested two days ago with five mobile phones, a dongal, Rs 13,300 in cash and a car with a licence plate bearing the registration number PB-13-AL-5393.

The SSP said the duo had links all over Punjab and moved huge amounts of drug money through hawala transactions. When arrested, Sandeep and Jaswant revealed the names of Kuldeep of Jathaul village in Gharinda, Bhagwan Singh and Gurpreet Singh alias Gopi of Mahawa village. They were nominated in the FIR.

The police arrested Kuldeep and Bhagwan Singh yesterday and seized Rs 6.90 lakh of drug money from them. They told the police that they used to pick up drugs on the instructions of Gurpreet Singh and hand over the drug money to Sandeep and Jaswant Singh. The two (Sandeep and Jaswant) also disclosed the names of Yogesh and Ajay of Kapurthala who were involved in the racket.

The SSP said that the police nabbed Yogesh and Ajay after an exchange of fire today. The police seized a country-made pistol, two rounds of cartridges and Rs 4.63 lakh of drug money from them. A Hyundai Creta car was also seized from them.

The SSP said further investigations were in progress and more arrests are likely to be made during the course of investigations.