Cops bust arms supplying gang, seize 9 country-made pistols

MUMBAI: The Crime Branch officers of the Mira-Bhayander-Vasai-Virar police have arrested eight men who were supplying illegal weapons to a Vasai-based mechanic.
Police have seized 9 country-made pistols, 21 cartridges and five mobile phones from their possession, valued at around ₹4 lakh.
The accused have been identified as Moin alias Younis alias Jalebi Abuyan Sayyed, Javed Iqbal Khan, Mohammad Arif alias Shahrukh Yusuf Khan, Ankit Rambujarth, Nishad alias Ankit Patel, Amit Vijay Nishad, Amit Kumar Mahajan Nishad, Alam alias Aleem Jhulkarnain Khan, and Deva Ajay Kumar Prajapati.
Madan Ballal, assistant commissioner of police (crime) said that information was received by the crime branch unit 2 officers that the accused Sayyed, who is a history sheeter, was in possession of an illegal pistol. Inspector Shahuraj Ranware and his team arrested the accused from Vasai’s Koliwada area based on the tip-off and recovered the pistol.
During interrogation, the accused revealed that he had stolen the pistol from a house in Koliwada. He also told the police that two more weapons were in that house. The officers followed this lead and arrested the owner, identified as Javed Iqbal Khan, and seized the weapons from the house during a search.
On further questioning, Khan, who worked in a garage, led the police to the eight other accused who were arrested from Vasai, Mumbai, Gujarat and Jaunpur in the case.
ACP Madan Ballal said that these accused intended to smuggle the weapons to Mumbai to commit crimes during the elections. “We arrested the men before they could smuggle the guns to the city,” Ballal said.
A team has also been sent to other states in search of the kingpin of the arms supply trade.