State police busts racket ‘illegally’ selling arms from licenced shop

Kolkata: The Special Task Force (STF) of the state police busted a racket that was selling arms and ammunition illegally through a licenced firearms selling shop.

Sources said Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had directed the Commissioner of Police (CP) to execute proper investigation and conduct audit of the documents of the last five years of those shops.

Till Sunday, a total of five persons, including an employee of the firearms shop, were arrested. A huge quantity of ammunition and firearms were seized. State Education minister Bratya Basu, during a programme, said: “The administration is alert. Before the election, BJP will instigate unrest…”

STF officials, acting on a tip off, conducted raids at a place in Jibantala of South 24-Parganas along with at Minakhan of North 24-Parganas and seized more than 200 bullets and a double barrel gun. During the raids, police arrested four persons Ashik Iqbal Gazi alias Bappa Gazi of Hasnabad, Haji Rasid Molla of Jibantala, Abdul Selim Gaji alias Bablu of Hasnabad and Jayanta Dutta of Santipur, Nadia.

Police found that the ammunition was made by the Ordnance Factory. On Saturday, the shop owner and a few other employees were interrogated by the STF officials.

The stock register along with a few other documents were seized. Officials said that there were several discrepancies in the documents which led to the seizure. After interrogating the four arrested accused, STF officials on Saturday arrested another person Faruk Mallick of Haroa in North 24-Parganas. It was learnt Jayanta Dutta used to supply cartridges and shells to gun shops. These later went into the hands of the criminals.