The Delhi Police Special Cell on Thursday claimed to have busted a racket of arms licence issued on the basis of fake and forged documents without police verification from Nagaland with the arrest of six such licence holders and two agents.
During the investigation, it was discovered that several residents of Delhi had obtained arms licence from Nagaland on the basis of fictitious documents before utilising these to purchase arms and ammunition from different dealers in Delhi and even some ordinance factories, said Rajiv Ranjan, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Special Cell).
“We undertook an extensive drive to gather information on such arms licencees, who had purchased arms and ammunition from dealers or gun houses in the NCR. The investigation revealed that a large number of residents of Delhi had procured such licence issued by the Dimapur Administration in Nagaland,” DCP Ranjan said. He said that as per the Ministry of Home Affairs guidelines, no arms licence can be granted without police verification, which includes antecedents of the applicant, assessment of threat, and other preconditions.
In the present case, he said, such arms licence holders had no threat to their lives; rather those who had been involved in criminal cases were themselves a threat. All those arrested were, he said, found to have been involved in criminal cases, but had succeeded in procuring arms licence from Nagaland.
“The seized arms licences are found to have been issued by the office of the District Magistrate Dimapur (Nagaland) with “All India” validity. However, an arms licence for All India validity can be granted after seeking prior concurrence of the MHA with full justification in deserving cases only,” Mr. Ranjan said.