NEW DELHI: The National Investigation Agency in collaboration with the police forces of Haryana, Punjab and Chandigarh, on Friday announced the establishment of a collective institutionalised mechanism for real-time as well as regular information sharing and coordinated action & operations against the gangster eco-system in the northern region.
According to NIA sources, they also decided to set up a ‘Joint Listing Committee’, with representative officers from the NIA and the three police forces, to list out and map the entire network of the various criminal syndicates active in the northern states and UT. It was further decided to hold monthly meetings of all the stakeholders to address the issue of organised crimes and criminals in these areas.
These decisions were taken at a high-level inter-state coordination meeting held in Panchkula, Haryana, under the chairmanship of NIA Director General, Dinkar Gupta, an NIA spokesperson said. The meeting discussed the activities of leaders and members of organized criminal syndicate groups operating in the northern states, and also the ongoing investigations in the various criminal cases connected with them. This was the second such meeting steered by the NIA DG for tackling the menace of organised criminal terror syndicates. The DG had initiated these meetings to collectively deal with such syndicates through sharing of findings and inputs among the various police agencies and forces.
Underscoring the need for collaborative action in combating organised crime, the NIA DG called for enhanced cooperation and information sharing among the NIA, Punjab Police, Chandigarh Police, and Haryana Police to effectively address the growing threat posed by these criminal syndicates, particularly in the northern region.NIA, which is investigating three such cases against criminal terror syndicates, shared its findings and observations on the methodology adopted by the syndicates operating from jails.
“It emphasised the need for fast-tracking of trials against these gangsters as an effective tool to tackle the problem, along with the need for a witness protection plan,” the NIA spokesperson said. Besides Gupta, others who attended the meeting included Haryana Director General of Police PK Agrawal, Punjab DGP Gaurav Yadav and DGP Chandigarh Praveer Ranjan. Other senior police officials from state intel and law and order wings of Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh were also present.