7 pen pistols seized in Munger, 3 arrested

According to police, operating a pen pistol is easy. The person concerned has to remove the cap and load the cartridge, which is very small compared to bullets used in a pistol or a revolver. It has a button (thrust device) which needs to be pressed for firing.

In a rare instance, seven sophisticated pen pistols were recovered from three arms peddlers who were arrested on Monday from Munger, a town in Bihar notorious for illegal manufacture of guns, police said.

The seized pen pistols. (HT)

Police have also recovered 14 live cartridges and ₹1.90 lakh in cash from their possession.

Additional director general of police (operation), Sushil M Khopde, said the golden pen pistol is a disguised firearm and looks like an old-fashioned ink pen. “This is for the first time in the last eight years that pen pistols have been seized. A pen pistol was seized in Muzaffarpur on December 17, 2015,” he said.

According to police, operating a pen pistol is easy. The person concerned has to remove the cap and load the cartridge, which is very small compared to bullets used in a pistol or a revolver. It has a button (thrust device) which needs to be pressed for firing.

Munger superintendent of police (SP) Jagunath Jalareddy said that acting on a tip-off, a police team raided a place under Kotwali police station limits and arrested the three suspects travelling on a motorcycle — identified as Mohammad Jamshed, a resident of Munger, and Arman Mandal and Bilal Mandal, natives of West Bengal.

During interrogation, Jamshed told police that he had earlier worked in West Bengal as a driver and came in contact with Arman and Bilal. Recently, both contacted him to procure pistols and arrived in Munger on a train on Monday morning.

“Jamshed sold the pen pistols to them for ₹15,000 apiece. After completing the deal, Jamshed offered to drop them at Jamalpur railway station, but were caught on way,” police said.

“During interrogation, Jamshed confessed that two years ago, someone gave him pen pistols to be sold to arms smugglers but he was not able to find a buyer. Later, he was arrested in an arms act case and was recently released from the jail,” the SP said, adding that seized pen pistols have been sent to experts to gather more information on how they function.