Village in Sriganganagar a hub of drug smuggling
Raj Sadosh
Abohar, August 20
The village, Chak 44-PS, located near the international border in Sriganganagar Sector, has emerged as drug smuggling hub for miscreants from India and Pakistan. Pakistani smugglers often drop heroin packets through drones while some residents of the village help them in committing the crime. Some locals had been arrested for their involvement in drug trafficking, and most of them had connections with smugglers living in Fazilka and Tarn Taran.
According to official sources, a packet dropped by a Pakistani drone was found at a Narma cotton field in the village. The drone contained 3kg heroin, and its value is estimated to be around Rs 15 crore in the international market.
A large packet was today found in the field of a farmer, Balwant Singh, following which police and BSF officials reached the spot. When the packet was opened, two small packets, each having 1.5kg heroin, were found with a tiger mark on them.
According to the police, an intelligence report regarding suspicious movement in the area had surfaced last night. Constable Kalu Ram was on vigilance duty. Prima facie it appeared that smugglers from the Indian territory could not succeed in taking away the packet.
The BSF, police and intelligence agencies conducted a search operation in the surrounding fields. In this regard, a case has been registered against unidentified persons under the NDPS Act.
In the last week of June, a Pakistani drone had circled over a field around this village and dropped some packets of heroin, which smugglers from Punjab, with the help of Jaswinder Singh Jassi of Salempura village, had allegedly managed to take away. Nearly 10 days after the incident, Jassi was arrested by the police with drug money of Rs 2 lakh.
A day before, Mukhtiar Singh (28) of the village, Baljit Singh (28) of Muhar Jamsher and Rajinder Singh (28) of Maujam Dhani were arrested on the basis of interrogation of Jassi, who had reportedly delivered heroin packets to a smuggler at the Fazilka bus stand.
