Ahmedabad: Booze hidden among edible oil packets

AHMEDABAD: A local crime branch (LCB) team of Ahmedabad Rural Police on Sunday found liquor bottles of different brands worth Rs 22.56 lakh concealed beneath mustard oil packets from a truck on Tarapur Crossroads on Bavla-Bagodara highway in the district.
The team also seized 1,236 mustered oils packets as they were used to conceal the liquor and treated it as Muddamaal (articles) used in a crime.
A team led by police inspector D N Patel along with other cops kept a watch at the highway following an input regarding liquor smuggling.
At Tarapur Crossroads, the cops stopped a truck having passing number of Haryana.
When the cops asked about the stuff in the truck, driver Harpreetsingh Jaat, 32, a native of Bhatinda in Punjab, told them that he was carrying mustard oil of a famous brand.
But when the cops checked inside the truck, they found boxes of liquor bottles too.
"We found 470 boxes of liquor bottles having 12 bottles in each box.
The price of total 5,640 liquor bottles is estimated to be Rs 22.56 lakh. We have also seized mustered oil packets worth Rs 1.42 lakh, the truck and two cellphones," said Patel.
Patel said that though the truck was from Haryana, the liquor was loaded at Dhule town in Maharashtra by a person identified as Thunthi.
"Thunthi told Jaat to take the truck to Junagadh and after reaching there, he was supposed to call up Thunthi again who would tell him more about delivery," said Patel.
Police have registered a case under the liquor prohibition act and began an investigation.