Criminals prefer costly, sophisticated fire arms to silence targets in city and state
Seven persons have been arrested by the crime branch for illegal possession and sale of guns.
The accused included two gun dealers, who have sold 10 pistols and three country-made guns to their customers. Both of them admitted to having acquired these guns through their contacts in Madhya Pradesh and involved in selling them to their customers in Ahmedabad.
Ramol police busted the racket of illegal firearms in the city and nabbed three men. They recovered six firearms, including four pistols, a revolver and a country-made gun each. The police also recovered 76 cartridges from these men.
The Sector-2 squad of the city police on Tuesday nabbed a gunrunner and his local dealer. The police also recovered a cache of a dozen firearms, two revolvers, two pistols, eight country-made handguns, six live rounds, two mobile phones and cash collectively worth Rs1.18 lakh.
Recent arms hauls by police might be just the tip of the iceberg, especially when back-to-back crimes involving guns have rocked Ahmedabad of late. Apart from a jeweller being fired at during Dhanteras on Sola bridge, two murders occurred in the Vastrapur area in quick succession.
Investigation revealed that instead of the outdated country-made guns aka Tamancha, criminals have been using high-end pistols and revolvers having calibers of 7.65 and 9mm each. Though the guns are locally manufactured in illegal factories, they are becoming popular among criminals as they have more firepower than country-made guns.
The recent seizures and arrests have unearthed the route from where these guns are being brought to the city and sold to criminals. Investigation also pointed out that these good-looking pistols and revolvers are mass produced in underground factories of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Just like drug peddlers, many dreaded criminals used to ferry between Gujarat and these states to sell these guns.
Since pistols and revolvers can fire repeatedly and with more precision than single-shotter country-made guns, they are a hot favourite among goons. In the recent loot-cum-murder case of Vastrapur, the police have learned that the goons had used these guns.
According to a police officer, these guns can be purchased for as low as Rs3,000-4,000 from UP and MP. “Then, the gun dealer sells it for as high as Rs15,000 to Rs50,000 in the city. Such a lucrative business is attracting many criminals, who have left their old businesses to take up gun selling in Gujarat,” said a senior police official.
The police have also learned that the jail visits of these criminals help them stay connected with other criminals, who can bring customers to the gun dealers.
Following the arrest of Prahladsinh Bhadoria, 44, and Jorawar Khan Baloch, 48, recently, Bhadoria, a native of MP’s Bhind district in the once notorious Chambal region, confessed to having smuggled the firearms into Gujarat.
Investigation further revealed that he met Baloch in Palanpur jail where the latter agreed to find customers for him. After acquiring arms from Bhadoria, Baloch used to sell those to his customers in the northern part of the state.
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