Jalandhar rural police arrest 13 members of Pinda gang

Chandigarh/Jalandhar, June 24

After a three-week-long operation, the Jalandhar Rural Police have busted an extortion and arms smuggling racket affiliated to the Pinda gang with the arrest of all 13 gang members—all are trained shooters—and six others involved in harbouring and providing logistics support.

This was stated by Senior Superintendent of Police Swapan Sharma on Friday.

A close aide of gangster Vicky Gounder, Palwinder Singh alias Pinda, whose role also emerged in the Nabha jailbreak, is said to be the kingpin of the gang and was apparently handling the gang with the help of Paramjit alias Pamma, a native of Shahkot, Jalandhar, currently residing in Greece.

The 13 arrested shooters have been identified as Sunil Masih alias Jeuna, Ravinder alias Ravi, Pradeep Singh, Manjinder alias Shavi and Sukhman Singh alias Subha, all of Lohian, Jalandhar; Sandeep alias Dilli, Major Singh, Aprail Singh alias Shera, Balwinder alias Guddha and Salinder Singh, all of Nakodar, Jalandhar; Satpal alias Satta of Makhu, Ferozepur; and Devinderpal Singh alias Deepu and Satwant Singh alias Jagga of Shahkot, Jalandhar.

All the arrested are history-sheeters and have been facing criminal cases for heinous crimes, including murder, attempt to murder, extortion and arms smuggling.

While six other persons, who were arrested for harbouring and providing logistics support, have been identified as Amarjeet alias Amar of Dharamkot; Balbir Masih, Erik and Badal, residents of Lohian; Harwinder Singh of Shahkot; and Bachittar Singh of Kapurthala.

The police also seized seven .32 bore pistols, three .315 bore pistols, a .315 bore gun, a .12 bore gun, a Toyota Innova, a Mahindra XUV 500 and foreign currency amounting to Rs 8 lakh from them.

The SSP said Paramjit alias Pamma used to finance the gang and send foreign currency via hawala to Amarjit alias Amar, who further used to distribute it among the gang to carry out various criminal activities.

He said the gang had been active for the past six years and was involved in organised extortion, armed highway robbery, land mafia and weapons smuggling from Madhya Pradesh.

“With their arrest, the police have been able to crack three blind cases of murder, extortion and highway armed robbery in Jalandhar and Bathinda,” said Swapan Sharma, adding that of the 19 arrested people, at least 12 were wanted by the police in eight criminal cases.