Arms racket in Kolkata busted, four arrested

Kolkata, May 9 (IANS) The Kolkata Police's Special Task Force (STF) on Friday announced that it had busted an illegal arms racket in the city and arrested four persons in this connection in the intervening night of May 8 and May 9.

According to a statement issued by the STF, its personnel, based on specific information, conducted a raid at Purba Beraberi under the jurisdiction of Narayanpur Police Station in the northern outskirts of Kolkata and busted the racket.

The four persons arrested in this connection have been identified as Linkon Hossain, 25, Bakibilla Gazi, 28, Faruk Sardar, 25, and Rajib Molla, 24. The STF sleuths recovered arms and ammunition from them, including a 7 mm semi-automatic pistol, single-shutter pipe-guns, 12 rounds of 7.65 mm live ammunition, and two rounds of 8 mm live ammunition

The sleuths have also seized an SUV from their possession.

"A case has been registered at Narayanpur Police Station under the Arms Act. The purpose of their movements, source of procurement of firearms will be enquired into," the statement from STF read.

The place of the arrests was quite near to the Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport in Kolkata. In the recent period, the STF sleuths have been especially active in unearthing illegal arms rackets in the areas under its jurisdiction.

In the wake of the heightened tension between India and Pakistan, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, this week, directed West Bengal Police and Kolkata Police to be especially careful about outsiders coming to the state with illegal arms and ammunition. She had also directed special checks at the railway stations so that similar attempts to enter the state with arms using the rail route could be foiled.

She also directed that the police personnel deployed at the check-posts at inter-state borders are specially careful on this count.

--IANS

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