Drug smuggling gang caught, six of them in police custody

A gang of Indian smugglers with links to their counterparts in Pakistan, who used to smuggle heroin from across the international border using a drone, have been arrested.

The Chhatargarh (Rajasthan) Police today said that six suspects from Hanumangarh and Fazilka districts were arrested in this connection. They have been identified as Mastan Singh of Fatehpur, his son Pragat Singh of Sangria, Hanumangarh; Baldev Singh, Amrik Singh and Harbhajan Singh, all residents of Jodha Bhaini village in Jalalabad; and Mohinder Singh from Muhar Khiva village in Fazilka.

According to police, a packet of heroin was recovered during a search after a damaged drone belonging to Pakistani smugglers was found in the BSF's Neelkanth post area. About 2.1 kg of heroin was found in the packet, which is worth about Rs 10 crore in the international market.

The suspects had reached the Neelkanth border post area to collect the consignment but managed to escape without the package after coming to know about the police presence.

Four of these smugglers were caught by the Punjab police the next day and have now been handed over to the Rajasthan police. Police later arrested two more of their accomplices. All were taken into police custody for questioning after appearing in court today.

Police sources said a farmer saw a drone lying in the field deep inside Indian territory. On his notification, police and BSF officials reached the spot. The drone was a large drone as it had six to seven cameras and sensors. The flight capacity of this Chinese-made drone was 9 km.

When the drone was found, police, BSF and intelligence agencies conducted a search operation across the area and later a package was found lying in a field three to four kilometers from the international border. The package contained two bags of heroin, each containing one kilogram of heroin. According to the police and BSF, the white cloth bags had the years 2021 and 2022 written on them. Bashir, whose name was written in Urdu on the bags, is said to be a drug smuggler from Pakistan.

The initial investigation revealed that all suspects belong to the same community and have been in contact with each other for a long time.