NIA arrests terrorist Arsh Dalla’s aide from Punjab’s Moga

NIA arrests terrorist Arsh Dalla’s aide from Punjab’s Moga
Chandigarh/Moga: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Thursday said it has arrested a resident of Moga district, Jassa Singh, who was allegedly working at the behest of Canada-based designated terrorist Arsh Dalla. The arrest was made during massive country-wide raids against the terrorist-gangster-narcotics smuggler nexus by the central agency under ‘Operation Dhvast’. The role of Jassa Singh, the NIA said, has been “established” in the Khalistan terror conspiracy and he had delivered a pistol at the instance of Arsh Dalla. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has detained another one Amritpal Singh Hayer, a close aide of Canada based gangsters and Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF) operatives Arshdeep Dalla and Sukhkha Duni.

The source said that Hayer was brought to India from the Philippines with the help of Interpol and other international agencies.

Wanted in several terror related cases, Hayer had been hiding in the Philippines. The NIA sources said that Hayer was taken into custody from Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport and then taken to Chandigarh. “Hayer was handling the entire operation from the Philippines. Hayer is affiliated with the Khalistani Tiger Force group. Hayer hails from Moga district of Punjab and has been involved in a number of murders that took place in Punjab,” the source said.

The NIA officials will now interrogate him at their Chandigarh-based zonal office. “His interrogation will lead us to expose his India network. We hope to make some arrests following his interrogation,” said the source.

The NIA in coordination with Punjab Police on Wednesday raided 324 locations and seized a huge cache of arms and ammunition, cash, besides other incriminating material.

During the operation, the agency recovered ₹39 lakh from the house of Harsimrandeep Singh, alias Sema, once the most-wanted gangster of Faridkot district, from Behbal Kalan village. Faridkot senior superintendent of police Harjeet Singh said the amount recovered by NIA from Sema’s house was handed over to the income tax department officials on Thursday. Sema is presently lodged in jail.

Moga senior superintendent of police J Elanchezian said there no case registered against Jassa and he has no previous criminal record. “He was a drug addict and also belong to native village of Dala,” he added.

While the NIA knocked 129 doors, Punjab Police launched searches at 143 places in 17 districts, according to an official release. The day-long searches were aimed at breaking the terror nexus of Arsh Dalla, a Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF) operative, apart from dreaded gangsters Lawrence Bishnoi, Chhenu Pehalwan, Deepak Teetar, Bhupi Rana, Vikash Lagarpuriya, Ashish Choudhary, Gurpreet Sekhon, Dilpreet Baba, Harsimrat Simma, Anuradha among others, said officials.

The raiding parties have seized a pistol, assorted ammunition (both live and used cartridges), besides 60 mobile phones, five DVRs, 20 SIM cards, a hard disk, a pen drive, a dongle, a WiFi router, a digital watch, two memory cards, 75 documents and ₹39.60 in cash, according to a NIA release.