Illegal arms unit busted in Masuri, one arrested

Ghaziabad: The police on Friday busted an illegal arms manufacturing factory near the Mughal garden area in Masuri and seized country-made weapons as well as weapons in the making in a raid and arrested a man.
On a tip-off, cops from the Masuri police station raided an abandoned place around 4.30am and unearthed the illegally operated factory, senior superintendent of police Deepak Kumar said.
They seized three ready-to-use .32- and .315-bore pistols, besides five live cartridges, eight barrels and other manufacturing equipment, the SSP said.
One man, identified as Mohammad Naeem, from Dhaulana in Hapur district, was arrested and later sent to jail under sections of the Arms Act, he said.
“We also seized a furnace, drilling machine hammers and other equipment used in running an arms factory,” said Ashish Srivastava, circle officer (rural).
“It is unlikely that only one person was running the entire factory. So the accused is being questioned to get leads on his accomplices,” Srivastava said.
Against the backdrop of the huge arms cache recovered in the raid, the police are not ruling out the possibility of more such factories.“It is election time and we cannot afford to leave anything to chance. So we are on high alert and have activated our network of informers to give us leads on more illegal arms factories that possibly exist in the area,” Srivastava said.