Police get vital leads on weapon suppliers

Tribune News Service

Patiala, April 8

Three days after the Rajpura police claimed to have busted a gang that was planning a robbery and arrested five of its members, the probe has now shifted to ascertain the channel used by the accused to procure weapons.

Sources say that the Madhya Pradesh module of weapons is under probe as the gang members were in touch with a person who would supply them the weapons. “Following the grilling of the accused, we have some vital leads and we are working towards identifying the nexus,” they said.

Three days ago, the Patiala police received a tip-off about a “five-member” gang who were in possession of illegal weapons and stolen vehicles. They were hiding in a residential area near a school on the ICL road in Rajpura and were planning a robbery.

Acting on the information, a special team was formed under the supervision of DSP (Rajpura) Bikramjit Singh Brar, which raided the place and arrested all five accused in the evening. The police had claimed to have recovered one .32-calibre pistol along with five cartridges, one .315-calibre countrymade pistol, two sharp weapons, two stolen motorcycles that were used in various crimes and a fake vehicle number plate from them.

“There are some leads and concrete information which we got after interrogating the suspects,” confirmed Brar. “Teams are working to make further arrests,” he stated.

The accused have been identified as Sunny Masih of Dera Baba Nanak, Gurdaspur; Shiv Kumar, a Bihar native at present residing in Banda Basti, Banur; Nishan Singh of Gurdaspur, Darshan Kumar of Rajpura and Gaurav Rajput, a native of UP at present residing at Banda Basti, Banur.

Preliminary interrogation of the accused revealed that they were operating under gangsters lodged in the Goindwal jail. The leader of the gang, Sunny Masih, has many criminal cases pertaining to narcotics and arms registered against him. He had procured the .32 calibre weapon from the possession of a Madhya Pradesh-based supplier. Sunny has a rivalry with Piara Singh, an aide of gangster Jaggu Bhagwanpur.

A case under Sections 399, 402 and 473 of the IPC and 25/54/59 (6) (7) of the Arms Act was registered.

Madhya Pradesh connect

Information gathered from police officials probing different cases reveal that the illegal weapon manufacturing industry has now shifted from Uttar Pradesh to Madhya Pradesh and the quality of semi-automatic weapons has improved a lot. “From as low as Rs 15,000 for a pistol to high-end weapons costing around Rs 50,000, all are made available to gangsters. Arms dealers operating in the state make the job easy as bullets are up for sale illegally by weapon dealers who do not even ask for weapon licences,” said a senior IPS officer, who recently busted one such racket.

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