LUCKNOW: Working on the information divulged by a gang of arms smugglers, Lucknow team of Special Task Force (STF) of UP police arrested senior Samajwadi Party leader and former MLA Thakur Rakesh Singh recovering a smuggled Brazilian Taurus 9mm pistol and 16 live cartridges from his possession in a late Monday night swoop down at his residence at Ramghat road in Aligarh.
Five other persons – one more in Aligarh, two in Sambhal and one in Delhi—were also arrested by the STF which recovered four illegal foreign-made weapons from their possession on Tuesday. With all the arrests, said the top police sources, the STF was close to busting an international organized arms racket in the state which was suspectedly being run from Myanmar.
According to police sources, the SP leader, who had been party MLA from Chharra constituency in Mathura district in the previous Assembly, was produced in the court where his application for bail was dismissed on Tuesday.
Consequently, Singh was taken into judicial custody and was sent to jail amidst slogan shouting and protests by Samajwadi Party workers.
Considered to be close to SP chief and former UP CM Akhilesh Yadav, Thakur Rakesh Singh was arrested from his residence after the recovery of the smuggled weapon from his possession. According to STF sources, Singh bought the pistol for Rs 4-4.5 lakh from an organized arms racket in the state. However, its actual prices is around Rs 22 lakh in the international market.
Sharing the other details of the operation, the district police chief Rajesh Pandey refused to reveal the names of the two kingpins rounded up in Aligarh and Sambhal. They had been running the racket and gave a tip off about the weapon they sold to the ex-MLA. “As the Operation is still underway, it will not be proper to reveal the names of the two kingpins,” said the cop.
Notably, last year, a Solevian arms dealer was arrested after raids at the house of a retired Colonel and his shooter son in Meerut, unearthing 44 guns. Firearms of various make and models like Glock (Austria), Beretta (Italy), Arsenal (Italy), Benelli (Italy) and Blaser (Germany) were seized along with expensive cameras, thermal imaging binoculars and cartridges.
However, reacting to the police action against Rakesh Singh, senior SP leaders called it political vendetta, wherein, the political adversaries of the ruling party were being targeted and tortured.
Meanwhile, the ex-MLA of SP has had a criminal history with extortion, house grabbing, patronage to anti-social elements and high handedness with government servants being the main charges against him.