Chandigarh, April 20
If you are a cop with cupboards full of skeletons, make sure your house is not burgled. And if it is, think twice before calling the police home for investigation. Surinder Singh Atwal, a former superintendent of Punjab police learnt this simple lesson, the hard way.
Atwal, who called the Chandigarh police to his house this morning following a theft, found himself behind bars by the evening after a huge cache of prohibited weapons was recovered from his house by the police.
Chandigarh cops, who had been called to his Sector 15 residence while carrying out an inspection of his house looking
for clues to the theft, stumbled upon a host of firearms, most of which are unauthorised.
As many as 1,351 cartridges of the prohibited AK 47 rifle, a 38 bore revolver along with 18 cartridges, 168 cartridges of a 9 mm pistol, seven empty magazines of AK 47 rifle, an empty drum of AK 47 rifle, 95 cartridges of self-loading rifle, a 303 rifle along with 59 cartridges and two chargers. Police sources said this is the largest haul of prohibited weapons from a cop’s house.
The former cop had called the police at his residence last night to report a theft allegedly committed by his security guard who decamped with gold ornaments.
According to the police, they received a call from the former cop last night informing them that his security guard had decamped with gold ornaments worth lakhs of rupees when he was out of station.
Surinder Singh told the police that he had gone to attend a marriage with his family and came back last night only to find his house ransacked.
Sources in the police said a police team rushed to Atwal’s residence and began investigations. The investigating officials instead found that the cop had weapons lying everywhere in the house. They were surprised with the recovery and informed their superiors about the findings.
It was learnt that Atwal played an active role during the days of insurgency in Punjab. He had reportedly seized these weapons during various encounters and raids and had not deposited the same with the police department, said a police officer.
The SHO of the Sector 11 police station Ramesh Chander told TNS that a case under provisions of the Arms Act had been registered against Surinder Singh and he had been arrested for the same. He was later produced before a local court which remanded him to judicial custody.
Meanwhile, the police arrested Ram Lal, the security guard, who was accused of stealing jewellery and recovered the stolen property from his possession.
