The Punjab Police on Sunday claimed to have busted an interstate arms smuggling gang with the arrest of three people from Batala in Gurdaspur district, officials said.
The gang was involved in the smuggling of arms from Madhya Pradesh and supplying them in Punjab, they said.
Eleven pistols, 15 cartridges and Rs 2 lakh in cash were seized from them, Director General of Police Gaurav Yadav said.
The accused were identified as Anmol Singh, Karandeep Masih and Jagroop Singh, all Batala residents, he said.
Mr Yadav said acting on secret information about illegal weapons being smuggled from Madhya Pradesh to supply them to criminal elements in the state, police teams from the Amritsar Counter Intelligence wing launched a special operation and apprehended three persons from the area of Fatehgarh Churian in Batala when they were travelling on their motorcycle.
"During questioning, the accused have disclosed that they were receiving money through 'Hawala' from their USA-based accomplices to buy arms and ammunition from Madhya Pradesh," he said in a statement.
Police teams are putting all efforts to unearth the whole network, and identify the complete procurement and supply chain across to bust the network, he said.
The USA-based accomplices have been identified as Kirandeep Singh Randhawa, a native of village Gurchak in Batala and Jarmanjit Singh, a native of Naurangabad in Tarn Taran.
Preliminary investigations have also revealed that the gang was hatching a conspiracy to target their rival gang members.
A case under relevant sections of the Arms Act, IPC and the Money Laundering Act has been registered, he said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
