Two SITs to probe liquor smuggling in Haryana's Ambala

AMBALA: Two special investigation teams (SITs) have been formed to probe a recent illicit liquor smuggling case in Ambala. While one team has been set up by district police, the other has been formed by the district, said deputy commissioner (DC) Ashok Kumar Sharma on Sunday.
On the night of September 11, a truck loaded with 290 boxes of illicit liquor, was seized under the Panjokhra police station (PS) area in Ambala.The smugglers had tried to show the contraband as aloevera bottles.
Tracking down the source of illicit liquor, police and excise teams struck upon two godowns in Mandour village of Ambala and seized 1,012 boxes of illicit liquor on Friday and Saturday.
On Saturday, a case was registered against an accused identified as Nikhil A Patel of Gujarat under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Excise Act at Panjokhra. Patel had allegedly taken the godowns at Mandour on lease for stocking aloe vera extract, police said.
Sources said a fact-finding team had been formed by the Haryana excise and taxation commissioner (ETC) to find out how such a huge quantity of liquor was illegally stocked in the godowns.
A senior officer of excise and taxation department in Ambala said: “In all, 15,626 bottles of four popular Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL) brands were seized from the truck and godowns. As per the labels, the liquor is bottled in four distilleries of the region, including three in Karnal, Samalkha-Panipat, and Sonipat in Haryana, and one in Punjab’s Dera Bassi. None of the bottles had any mention of distilleries in Ambala.”
From the truck, police seized 142 boxes (1,704 bottles) of McDowell’s No 1 and 148 boxes (1,776 bottles) of Royal Challenge on Friday night. Both had been marked ‘for sale in Haryana’.
From the godowns, police seized 293 boxes (3,516 bottles) of Imperial Blue ‘for sale in Chandigarh’ and 719 boxes plus two extra bottles (8,630 bottles) of Old Monk Rum ‘for sale in Haryana (CSD)’, said the officer.
DSP Ambala Madan Lal, who is heading police SIT, said, “We have collected samples of the recovered liquor and sent the same to laboratory for checking whether the liquor is genuine or spurious. The investigation is being done to trace the main accused who stocked liquor at Mandour village.”
“We have to check whether the labels and holograms on the seized bottles are genuine or fake, and the concerned companies and distilleries will be roped in to verify the same,” said an excise department officer.
DC Sharma said the two teams will carry out “parallel” probes. “The police SIT will be tracing out accused involved in stocking such a huge quantity of illicit liquor, while district SIT will investigate how liquor reached godowns,” said the DC.