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Chandigarh: The Punjab police arrested pro-Khalistan activist and Khadoor Sahib MP Amritpal Singh’s elder brother Harpreet Singh with 4 gm of Ice drug (methamphetamine, also known as crystal meth) from him on Jalandhar-Panipat national highway near Phillaur late Thursday night.
Stating that so far three persons have been arrested in the case registered under NDPS Act, the police said on Friday that while Harpreet alias Happy belongs to village Jally Khera, other accused Lovepreet Singh belongs to Cheema Bath village, both in Amritsar district and the third accused Sandeep Arora belongs to Ludhiana.
The Jalandhar (rural) senior superintendent of police (SSP) Ankur Gupta said that a police team which intercepted a Hyundai Creta cark (with tinted glasses) parked along the highway near Phillaur around 11 pm, on checking recovered 4 gm of Ice, a digital scale, a lighter and two mobile phones from Harpreet and Lovepreet. When asked, the accused told police that they had brought the drug from Sandeep Arora, a drug peddler.
Gupta said that the accused admitted that they had digitally transferred Rs 10,000 to Sandeep and bought the drug for consumption. The dope test of Harpreet and Lovepreet was found to be positive, the SSP said adding the police, which recovered the said drug from Harpreet’s pocket, also found a half-burnt Rs 20 currency note and foil papers used for consuming drugs. Stating that Sandeep is a drug peddler and had been booked in several drug cases, Gupta said that the criminal background of Harpreet and Lovepreet was also being looked into.
Notably, Amritpal, who also headed `Waris Punjab De’ outfit and is currently lodged in Assam’s Dibrugarh jail under National Security Act (NSA) and contested the recent Lok Sabha in absentia from jail, had been running an anti-drug crusade to eliminate drug menace from the state. He was arrested along with his nine associates after a month-long hunt by the state police on February 23 last year for forcing his way into Ajnala police station, brandishing swords and guns and hurting several police personnel to free one of his associates.
CONSPIRACY TO DEFAME FAMILY: FATHER
Meanwhile, reacting to Harpreet's arrest, his father Tarsem Singh said that it was a government's conspiracy to defame the family and supporters of Amritpal. Stating that the government was doing it to hide its own failures, to fail Amritpal's crusade to save the youths of state from drugs and release of Bandi Singhs (Sikh prisoners who had completed their jail terms), he said. He went on to add that it was a conspiracy of the government which was working under influence of drug cartels.
