8 mobiles, heroin recovered in Amritsar jail; 3 inmates booked

Three inmates were booked after eight mobile phones and a heroin were recovered from the Amritsar Central Jail during a search, police said on Friday

Three inmates were booked after eight mobile phones and a heroin were recovered from the Amritsar Central Jail during a search, police said on Friday.

The state government had appointed BSF officials as jail superintendents in four jails of Punjab in August to curb the entry of banned items in prisons and control the activities of gangsters and hardcore criminals inside jails.

The accused have been identified as Randeep Singh, alias Deepu, of Phattu Bhilla village, Samsher Singh, alias Shera, of Kohali village in Amritsar, and Sukhchain Singh, alias China, of Margindpura village in Tarn Taran district.

The seizure was made on Thursday when prison’s room number 7 situated in barrack number 6 was searched. A case under Sections 42 and 52-A of the Prisons Act has been registered at the Islamabad police station in Amritsar on the complaint of assistant jail superintendent Balvir Singh. He said: “During checking, 12gm of heroin and three mobile phones—two feature phones and one smart phone—with their SIM cards were recovered from the possession of Deepu. Similarly, two feature phones were recovered from Shera while one from Sukhchain.”

He further said when the barrack’s garbage was searched, two mobile phones were recovered from it.

Sub-inspector (SI) Jatinder Singh, who is investigating the case, said the accused would be brought on production warrant to ascertain their backward and forward linkages.

The seizure of eight mobiles in a day has also exposed the security chinks of the high security jail. The state government had appointed BSF officials as jail superintendents in four jails of Punjab in August to curb the entry of banned items in prisons and control the activities of gangsters and hardcore criminals inside jails.