Gurgaon: Truck with illegal liquor seized, police conduct searches

The liquor was found hidden in 848 cartons under gunny bags filled with wheat husk and the truck was seized around 2am on Thursday near Pachgaon chowk on KMP expressway.

The Gurgaon police have conducted searches on Saturday in Panipat in connection with the seizure of a truck containing a large quantity of Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL) being taken illegally to Uttar Pradesh (UP).

A team of crime branch from Farrukhnagar conducted searches at three places in Panipat at the instance of Suresh, the driver of the truck from which 848 cartons of liquor pouches were seized on Thursday.

A team of crime branch from Farrukhnagar conducted searches at three places in Panipat at the instance of Suresh, the driver of the truck from which 848 cartons of liquor pouches were seized on Thursday, the police said.

The police said they are looking for a suspect named Vijay, who was named by Suresh during questioning, but could not locate him.

The liquor was found hidden in 848 cartons under gunny bags filled with wheat husk and the truck was seized around 2am on Thursday near Pachgaon chowk on KMP expressway. The truck was intercepted on the basis of specific intelligence, the police said.

The police said the liquor was sourced from a distillery in Himachal Pradesh and was being taken to UP.

“The crime branch of Gurgaon has started a concerted drive against the liquor mafia and the arrest of the driver will help in connecting the dots. A team of Farrukhnagar crime branch, which had set up a barricade KMP expressway, found the truck driver taking a U-turn and stopped him and it led to the seizure,” said Sumit Kuhar, DCP (crime). The papers for transporting wheat husk were not proper and the registration papers of the truck were also found to be fake, the police said.

The police further said the modus operandi adopted by the racket is unique as four to five drivers are employed to transport the liquor.

The drivers have to cover a specific distance only and they neither know the origin nor the destination of the consignment. “That way, the racketeers ensure that even if a truck is intercepted, the network remains intact and this illegal trade continues,” Kuhar said.

Last month, Gurgaon police had seized a large quantity of IMFL that was being smuggled. On July 13, the crime branch, Palam Vihar, seized 800 cartons of illicit liquor which was brought into the city in a truck by three men. Two persons were arrested in connection with the case but the driver had managed to flee.

On July 7, the Gurgaon police had arrested two men and seized an SUV near Bristol chowk and recovered 118 bottles of beer from the vehicle.