Amidst the ongoing drive to make Punjab a safe and secure state as per the vision of Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann, Punjab Police busted a terror funding module, backed by Pak-based Harwinder Singh Rinda and being operated by Parminder Pindi, with the arrest of its five operatives. Parminder Pindi, who is a local handler, was directly in touch with Gangster Harpreet Singh alias Happy Passia, a close aide of designated terrorist Harwinder Rinda.
Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Gaurav Yadav has identified the arrested persons as Amanpreet Walia of Baba Bakala in Amritsar, Ramanbir Singh alias Fouji of village Mucchal in Amritsar, Arshpreet Singh of village Bullenangal in Amritsar, Harmanpreet Singh of Bal Sarai in Amritsar and Kirandeep Kaur of Amritsar.
He said that following a few incidents of liquor vends being targeted by means of arson or firing to extort money from liquor contractors, Police teams from district Batala launched a thorough probe into the matter and identified Ramanbir Singh alias Fouji among 11 accused persons as culprits behind these incidents. In at least 10 day long operation, Police teams have successfully arrested five accused persons from different locations, he added.
Sharing more details, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Batala Ashwini Gotyal said that an incident of attempted arson at one liquor vend in Shastri Nagar, Batala was reported on September 27, and two days later, a similar incident of attempted arson at a liquor vend in Batala was reported. While, on October 2, five shots were fired at one of the liquor vend of Amritsar Rural.
She said that preliminary investigations revealed that all the accused persons were working on the directions of local handler Parminder Pindi, who was threatening and demanding extortion for terror funding from liquor contractors. She said that one of the accused persons opened fire outside the liquor vend in lieu of money.
Meanwhile, two cases in this regard including FIR number 150 dated 27.09.2023 under sections 436, 427 and 120B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and FIR No 112 dated 30.09.2023 under sections 307, 436, 427 and 34 of the IPC and sections 17, 18 and 20 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act have been registered at Police Stations City Batala and Sadar Batala respectively.