3 days before polls, man held with 7 guns, bullets

The Mumbai police, on Monday, arrested a suspected gun-runner from Bihar and recovered seven guns and 12 live rounds of ammunition.

The Mumbai police, on Monday, arrested a suspected gun-runner from Bihar and recovered seven guns and 12 live rounds of ammunition.

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The seizure follows an alert issued by the crime branch in December 2011 warning of a flow of illegal arms into the city with an intent to disrupt the civic polls.

Javed Alam Mustafa Shabir, 36, was arrested by the police soon after he arrived at the Lokmanya Tilak Train Terminus from Patna. Shabir was carrying six revolvers and one pistol. Twelve live rounds were also recovered from him. All the weapons had US markings on them, though police say they were far from original.

Sunil Paraskar, additional commissioner of police, Special Branch, said Shabir's identity was betrayed by his voter identification card, though he was carrying a driver’s licence with a Bhulabhai Desai Road, Mahalaxmi address. Paraskar said the man claimed to have been employed as a business executive with a leading private bank at Lower Parel. He was drawing a salary of around Rs15,000 per month. However, six months ago, following disputes in his family, he quit his job and went to his native place Patna. “He claims he was offered Rs5,000 to carry the consignment from Patna to Mumbai,” Paraskar said.