Senior superintendent of police Harkamal Preet Singh Khakh said that acting on intelligence inputs, an operation was conducted by a team of the Malerkotla crime investigation agency (CIA), led by inspector Harjinder Singh, under the supervision of DSP, detective, Amarjit Singh. The team found that the three accused from Kolkata in West Bengal were attempting to smuggle a substantial quantity of opium into Malerkotla.
The police intercepted them near the Malerkotla bus stand and found the 2.56kg of opium concealed in a black bag along with the drug money. The accused had procured the opium from West Bengal and were intending to sell it in Malerkotla.
They were booked under the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.
Efforts are on to identify and arrest other members of the trafficking network, the SSP said.