BHUBANESWAR: The Government Railway Police (GRP) on Wednesday arrested the prime accused of an inter-state drugs black marketing and illegal firearm racket from Saubhagya Nagar here with seizure of sedatives worth `2.5 lakh.
The accused, Sonu Panda, was nabbed from a rented house and a raid was conducted at an illegally-run godown in Baramunda Housing Board Colony from where a huge quantity of cough syrup and Alprozolam strips were seized.
While Panda’s aide managed to escape, two country-made pistols and four live ammunition and two motorcycles have been seized from the house.
GRP sources said Panda leads a gang which operates from West Bengal. In September 2016, the GRP had arrested three members of the gang including a railway parcel clerk who were involved in looting a medicine consignment worth `18 lakh from the railway station.Three other members of the gang have been recently arrested from Raniganj area in West Bengal. While Panda has been produced in a court and remanded in judicial custody, a GRP team will head to Raniganj soon to seek the remand of the three accused for further investigation, GRP IIC Saubhagya Swain said.