—CROSS-BORDER NETWORK WAS USING HAWALA CHANNELS FOR FINANCIAL TRANSACTIONS: DGP GAURAV YADAV
— MORE ARRESTS AND RECOVERIES ARE LIKELY IN COMING DAYS: CP ASR GURPREET BHULLAR
CHANDIGARH/AMRITSAR, June 25:
In a major breakthrough amidst the ongoing drive to make Punjab a safe and secure state as per directions of Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann, Amritsar Commissionerate Police, in a joint operation with a central agency, has busted a cross-border illegal arms, narcotics, and hawala network with the arrest of seven individuals, including one Afghan National and one Juvenile, and recovered 10 sophisticated weapons, 5.048 kg heroin, ₹30.38 lakh hawala money from their possession, said Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Gaurav Yadav here on Thursday.
This arrested have been identified as Jaspreet Singh alias Kalu (21) of village Khurmanian in Amritsar; Jagjit Singh alias Jaggi (40), a native of Jalalabad in Afghanistan and presently residing at Tilak Nagar in New Delhi; Gopal Sharma alias Gaurav (21) of Islamabad in Amritsar; Aniket Sahota (21) of Ram Nagar Colony in Amritsar; Prabhjeet Singh alias Prabh (26) of Gumtala Colony in Amritsar; Rajbir Singh alias Aryan (22) of Maqboolpura in Amritsar and one Juvenile.
The recovered weapons include one 9MM UZI Sub Machine Gun (Made in Italy), one 9MM Ghaffar Sub Machine Security Gun (9mm Automatic), four 9MM Glock Pistols (Made in Austria), one 9MM Zigana Sport Pistol, one Cold King Commando Semi Automatic Pistol (.30 Bore), one Scorpion Zigana Tisas Turkiye Pistol (.30 Bore) and one .30 bore Pistol. Apart from recovering weapons, narcotics and hawala money, police teams have also impounded their motorcycle.
DGP Gaurav Yadav said that preliminary investigation has revealed that the accused were allegedly linked to foreign-based handlers operating through social media platforms.
Arrested accused persons were receiving consignments of narcotics and illegal arms to further distribute them to criminal elements, he said, while adding that the network was using hawala channels for financial transactions across various locations.
The DGP said that further investigation is underway to establish backward and forward linkages to identify additional associates connected with the foreign-based network in this case.
Commissioner of Police (CP) Amritsar Gurpreet Singh Bhullar said that acting swiftly on specific intelligence inputs, police teams conducted an operation leading to arrest of accused Jaspreet alias Kalu along with one juvenile and 220 grams heroin was recovered from their possession.
During further investigation of forward and backward linkages in this case, two more members of this module identified as Gopal alias Gaurav and Aniket Sahota were arrested on disclosure of Jaspreet alias Kalu and 4.8 kg heroin was recovered, he said, while adding that further investigation has led police to another accused Afghan-National Jagjit alias Jaggi, who was actively involved in hawala transactions and handling hawala money generated through the illegal network.
The CP said that based on interrogation of accused Jagjit Jaggi, police teams further arrested his associates Prabhjeet alias Prabh and Rajbir alias Aryan. During search and follow-up investigation conducted on disclosures made by accused Prabhjeet Singh, police recovered a cache of 10 sophisticated illegal weapons along with huge Hawala money amounting to ₹30.38 lakh, he added.
CP Gurpreet Bhullar said that it has also emerged during investigation that accused Jagjit Singh alias Jaggi has previous criminal involvement and cases have earlier been registered against him under relevant provisions of law. More arrests and recoveries are likely in coming days, he added.
In this regard, a case FIR no. 177 dated 13-06-2026 under sections 21-B, 21-C, 27-A and 29 of the NDPS Act and sections 25(6, 7, 8) of the Arms Act has been registered at Police Station Islamabad in Amritsar.
