Liquor smuggling runs on train

Ramashankar May 02, 2018 

Liquor bottles seized from the Ahmedabad-Patna Express 

on Tuesday. Telegraph picture

Patna: A loco pilot, an assistant loco pilot and a guard of an express train were among the four persons arrested on Tuesday for smuggling 10 cartons of Indian made foreign liquor, police said.

Acting on a tip off, a joint team of the Railway Protection Force and the Government Railway Police conducted a surprise check in the driver's cabin (compartment for the driver) of the Ahmedabad-Patna Express at Danapur railway junction and found five liquor cartons.

The members of the raiding team were informed that at least 10 cartons of IMFL were being transported on the train from Uttar Pradesh and the consignment was to be delivered at Ara railway station in Bhojpur and at Patna Junction. During the search, the team could lay hands on five cartons only.

During interrogation, guard Manjeet Kumar Singh, a resident of Banka, and his friend Mohammad Nausha Ali, also an employee of the Indian Railways and a resident of Bhagalpur, admitted they had delivered five cartons of liquor to a man at Ara railway station.

Driver Mohammad Shashuddin was taken into custody after the train reached Patna Junction. Confirming the arrests, Patna superintendent of rail police Ashok Kumar Singh said the fourth person arrested for smuggling of liquor was identified as Santosh Chaubey, an assistant loco pilot of Ahmedabad-Patna train.

A total of 24 bottles of IMFL and 64,650 litres of country liquor were seized from the bag, which was kept in the driver's cabin. An FIR was lodged with the Danapur GRP against the four persons, who were later produced in the railway court, which remanded them to 14 day judicial custody. "The transportation of liquor by train is the latest modus operandi of bootleggers in Bihar, which came under total prohibition in April 2016," said Singh.

A little over 1.2 lakh people have been arrested in the state on charges of violating the prohibition law since the state was declared dry. A senior IPS officer had recently pointed out that the liquor peddlers were using trains as mode of transportation to smuggle it from outside the state.