Chandigarh, December 4
Claiming that organised crime of kidnapping, hawala transactions and drug money were interlinked, the Punjab Government has asked the Central Government to give powers of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to five SSPs in Punjab.
The ED works under the Department of Revenue, Government of India and at present information between the various forces and the ED is shared on a case-to-case basis which can take time. The Punjab Government says the SSP’s of Amritsar, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Hoshiarpur and Patiala should be given the powers to investigate high-profile revenue matters relating to foreign transactions.
The State Government has pointed out at a clause in the existing rules which allows the Central Government to empower any officer with powers of the ED. At present the ED has eight teams in north India in an area extending from Jammu to Jodhpur in Rajasthan.
Punjab Police had found that funds had been channelled through the hawala route in case of a high-profile kidnapping case In Amritsar. The same route is preferred by non-resident Indians to send in money. In some cases all this also leads to tax evasion in lakhs of rupees. In the past, cases of militants using the hawala route to send in money to their contacts here have surfaced.
The Punjab Government has said that the state has become a transit point for drugs and there was a possibility of the gains from drug dealing being used here also. Once the SSPs are empowered they would be having their own sources to keep track on developments with relation to organised crime.
