3 held in Punjab for transporting 8 kg opium through ambulance

Chandigarh, July 24 (IANS) Punjab Police on Sunday busted an inter-state drug smuggling racket and recovered eight kg opium concealed in a pillow being used by a fake patient lying in an ambulance.

The accused, who were arrested from the Ambala-Chandigarh highway near Dapper village, have been identified as Ravi Shrivastav (28), from Uttar Pradesh's Rampur, currently living in Chandigarh, Harinder Sharma (47), from SAS Nagar and Ankush (27), from Chandigarh.

Deputy Inspector General of Police, Ropar Range, Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, said the busting of the inter-state module has raised serious concerns about the misuse of emergency services.

"It has come to the fore during investigation that how the accused had purchased a second-hand ambulance and started using it for smuggling drugs," he said.

This was at least for the 10-12th time that the accused have used the ambulance to smuggle opium from Bareilly, he added.

According to DIG Bhullar, three Senior Superintendents of Police (SSPs) in the range have been asked to hold meetings with representatives of all hospitals and NGOs in their districts and get the list of ambulances assigned to them so that the police could provide safe passage to genuine patients.