New Delhi, Oct 29 (Bureau) The Uttar Pradesh Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS) in a joint operation with Azamgarh police on Friday busted an inter-state gang of smugglers of illegal arms and arrested two persons, an ATS spokesman said. The spokesman said that a huge cache of finished, semi-manufactured illegal weapons as well as cartridges and empty cartridges, semi-made pen-guns and materials for producing weapons were recovered from them. It may be noted that there has been a considerable drop in crime and criminal activity in the state as a result of the UP Police’s ongoing operations against offenders. The ATS spokesman said that it had acquired confidential information that two people from the district of Azamgarh, along with their other associates, were engaged in the manufacturing and smuggling of illicit firearms. The data was gathered through electronic and physical surveillance. It was discovered that Aftab Alam, a resident of Falahnagar in the Bilariyaganj police station in Azamgarh and Mainuddin Sheikh, a resident of the village and post of Patiala Gauspur in the same district, were involved in the production of illegal weapons, the acquisition of cartridges from the gun house, and the illegal sale and smuggling of those items.
Following this, UP ATS took joint action with Azamgarh Police and arrested both of them.Aftab Alam has been involved in illicit arms production and smuggling for the past several years, according to information obtained during interrogation. He has previously served two jail terms. The illegal weapons, cartridges, and other supplies were snuggled by Mainuddin Sheikh.Mainuddin Shaikh used to smuggle illegal arms and cartridges from Gun House in Azamgarh for a long time and he had also set up a factory to manufacture arms on his agricultural land in Ibrahimpur village near Kudhhi Dhala in Devara area of ??district Azamgarh. Due to the flood, he was currently operating this factory from his house.During interrogation it was also revealed that the weapons manufactured in the factory were smuggled to different areas of Purvanchal through Aftab Alam and the operator of Qazi Gun House Asifganj Pandey Bazar Road Azamgarh, Syed Qazi Arshad. Both of them used to get the cartridges illegally from the gun house and supply them as per the demand. It has also been learned that the accused has connections with Nepal, Pakistan, and Dubai. A case has been registered against Aftab Alam and Mainuddin Sheikh at police station Bilariaganj, district Azamgarh after the recovery of a large quantity of manufactured, semi-manufactured illegal arms, cartridges, empty cartridges, semi-made pen guns (state-of-the-art), weapons making items and mobiles.