LUDHIANA, May 13 — The district police today busted a hawala gang operating all over the state with the arrest of a hawala operator, Surjit Singh, allegedly working for the Dubai-based Dawood Ibrahim gang.

The hawala operator was arrested by a police party, led by Mr Joginder Singh of the CIA, after almost a 12-km-long ‘filmi style chase’ from Raur village to the Basti Jodhewal chowk this morning.

“The police had received reliable information about this operator doing transaction worth more than Rs 1 crore each month,” informed SSP, Mr Kuldeep Singh.

This hawala operator was working with several other operators in small pickets in the villages of Jalandhar, Amritsar, Nawanshahr and Ludhiana, said the DSP, Mr Satish Kumar Malhotra, who is handling the case. “With the arrest of this person, we are likely to receive information about their links in Dubai and Delhi, from where the money was being passed on to him. The names and whereabouts of other operators in the area are also likely to be revealed during his interrogation,” he said.

Meanwhile, during an exclusive talk with TNS after his arrest, Surjit Singh revealed that he was into this business for the past three years and was receiving money for transactions to the tune of Rs 50 lakh to Rs 1 crore on an average.

He revealed that his brother, Makhan Singh, who was an electrician in Dubai, had links with some of Dawood Ibrahim’s men and was arranging the hawala deals for him. He said that he owned a sanitary shop, but some 10 years ago, when he suffered major losses in his business, he took up this work.