With the Lok Sabha elections in 2024 in sight, border patrolling has been tightened up on Gujarat’s borders. This has given rise to creative ways of smuggling, albeit in vain. The state monitoring cell busted one such operation where passenger buses from Rajasthan were used to smuggle liquor to Gujarat.
The state monitoring cell, acting on a tip-off, intercepted a sleeper bus from Rajasthan, where the liquor smuggling was taking place by creating a secret compartment under the sleeper coach.
The state monitoring cell on the morning of Apr 7 had set up a watch near RTO Circle. The bus driver and staff, upon seeing the authorities, tried to run away but were caught.
The police removed the seats, checked for contraband, and found 588 liquor bottles of different brands worth ₹1.25 lakh hidden in secret compartments.
The preliminary investigation revealed that a friend of the bus owner had loaded the liquor from a petrol pump near Bakra in Rajasthan and instructed the driver to reach Ahmedabad and call a certain number to deliver the quantity of liquor.
He was then supposed to supply liquor to the bootlegger, reaching Odhav or Adalaj in Ahmedabad.
The police have nabbed three including the bus driver Dilipsinh Deva (Sirohi), Vikram Garad (Jalore), and Chhaganlal Mali (Sirohi), and found that the bus was owned by Okhsinh Rajput of Jalore, and the liquor was loaded by his friend Abhimanyusinh.