Amid reports the price of Indian made foreign liquor (IMFL) had sky-rocketed on the black market during the lockdown in West Bengal, the state excise department seized huge quantity of alcohol and made arrests in Malda and Murshidabad districts between Thursday night and Friday morning.
Several bottles of IMFL were seized from an ambulance in Malda, during one of the raids.
Raids were conducted at two hotels owned by a local Trinamool Congress leader and a local Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader respectively. Leaders of both the parties distanced themselves from the two leaders and disowned them.
The first raid was conducted at a hotel owned by the BJP leader in the Raghunathganj police station area of Murshidabad. The leader was not present but an employee was detained by excise department officials.
The second raid was conducted at the TMC leader’s hotel at Mathurapur in Raghunathganj area.
“The hotel doesn’t have a license to sell liquor. The manager was arrested,” an excise department official said on condition of anonymity.
“We have seized more than 65 litres of liquor from the two hotels. The arrested men were produced before a court on Friday,” the officer added.
{{/usCountry}}“We have seized more than 65 litres of liquor from the two hotels. The arrested men were produced before a court on Friday,” the officer added.
{{/usCountry}}In the third incident at Habibpur in Malda, three men were arrested while they were smuggling a huge quantity of liquor in an ambulance.
“We arrested three youths. They have been identified as Babla Saha, 23, Abhijit Haldar, 22, and Biswajit Mukherjee, 22,” Purnendu Mukherjee, inspector-in-charge of Habibpur police station, said.