Delhi:
Delhi Police today claimed to have smashed two gun running rackets stretching from Bihar to the national capital with the arrest of ten youths and recovery of 11 pistols.
While a gang of seven was apprehended by Crime Branch in a span of four days from November 18, South District Police arrested three persons on November 19.
The arrests by Crime Branch team came following investigations into an input about the operations of Sandeep Dahiya, the alleged kingpin of the racket, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) Ashok Chand said.
"Dahiya told police that he along with his accomplice Vicky Sharma procured weapons from Bihar and sold them in NCR. They used to procure a weapon for around Rs 18,000 and then sell it for more than 30,000," Chand said.
They also used to go for a barter system, exchanging stolen vehicles for weapons and ammunition.
Besides Dahiya (25) and Vicky (20), the other persons arrested were identified as Anil Sharma (30), Surender (24), Surender alias Bhondra (30), Abdul Sattar (22) and Mohd Asif (20), police said.
"The firearms were manufactured in Bihar and smuggled to Delhi," Chand said adding, two stolen vehicles and five pistols were recovered from them.
The first to be arrested was Anil on November 18 on a tip-off that he would come near Ghevara More, while on the same day Surender was apprehended from Rohini when he came there to allegedly deliver a stolen vehicle to the gang.
Surender was to be given a pistol and ammunition for the vehicle, Chand said adding, the vehicle was stolen from Chandigarh. Bhondra was apprehended later. On November 22, Dahiya and Vicky were arrested along with Sattar and Asif.
In the second incident, three persons -- Tariq Anwar Siddique (25), Mohd Illiyas (48) and Mohd Jahiruddin (45) -- were arrested by South District Police for their alleged involvement in selling semi-automatic weapons to gangs.
The arrests came after police received an input that a consignment would exchange hands near Thyagraj Park in Kotla Mubarakpur, H G S Dhaliwal said.
Tariq disclosed that he had been working as a courier agent for Manji and Kamran, the front men of a big arms syndicate situated in Bihar's Munger, he claimed and added that it was Taiq's sixth trip to Delhi.
Illiyas is an alleged middleman on whose disclosure Jahiruddin, a mechanic of mixer juicer machines was arrested.
The syndicate has been operating for the last 4-5 years. Jahiruddin was earlier arrested by Crime Branch in 2006 when a huge consignment of 23 pistols were recovered from a gang.
They used to travel in general coaches of trains and sling a bag like a student so as to evade police suspicion. They also used to wrap weapons in a folder meant for carrying files to avoid detection during search. Normally they used to avoid using mobile phones, police said.