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Arms supply gang’s goose gets cooked
KATHMANDU, AUG 17 -
In a mega operation against arms suppliers, police on Tuesday morning busted two members of an arms smuggling racket that had long been supplying arms and ammunition to Capital-based criminal gangs.
A special squad of the Metropolitan Police Range (MPR), Hanumandhoka, arrested Ram Binaya Singh, 28, and Binod Chaudhary, 34, of Sarlahi from Kalimati area and seized two 9mm pistols with 19 rounds of bullets, a revolver with three bullets and two 36mm plastic handgrenades, four magazines and 26 rounds of bullets.
Investigators have dubbed the bust a major hit in the fight against the burgeoning small arms supply to the Capital. The gang is said to have smuggled in at least one-fourth of the weapons making entry into the Capital.
SP Ramesh Kharel at the MPR said they brought in weapons for their Capital-based prospective clients involved in criminal activities such as abduction, extortion and hooliganism. Kharel said the arrest was a part of the special drive against the racket and arms and ammunition stashed in the Capital.
Investigators managed to get hold of the arms dealers with the help of call details obtained from other armed criminals who were arrested earlier.
The police had put the duo under surveillance for more than two months, and the MRP had also dispatched a police team to Rautahat to unearth the arms racket.
The bust has helped police break the link between arms suppliers in Tarai and Kathmandu. Police said that Binod was working as a mediator between arms suppliers and prospective criminal clients while Ram Binaya used to bring in the arms into the city from India via Rautahat. Binod and his brother Pramod, who is at large, were running the racket under the cover of a vegetable shop in Thamel area.
Both Binod and Ram Binaya told sleuths that they sold sell 9mm pistols for Rs. 90,000, revolvers for Rs. 60,000 and a grenade for Rs.35,000. Police suspect that some criminals could have ordered the powerful grenades - similar to those grenades used by state security personnel — to cause heavy damage to public property. Police said home-made weapons, the cheapest of the lot, come in from Tarai region while more sophisticated arms are smuggled in from India because of a porous border.
Posted on: 2010-08-18 08:04
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