Purshottam Sondhi allegedly carrying 22 kg of Heroin

Purshottam Sondhi was arrested by DRI officials on the highway leading to Amritsar’s Raja Sansi International Airport late on Saturday night. The Akali Dal functionary from Jalandhar was allegedly carrying 22 kg of the prized narcotic carefully wrapped in sheets of carbon paper possibly to escape detection during baggage X-ray at the airportContained in 26 plastic packets and wrapped in carbon sheets, the heroin was meticulously laid out between dozens of suiting. A DRI officer told reporters that Mr Sondhi was merely a courier who had been instructed to await a call at the airport parking lot after which he would have handed over the suitcase containing the narcotics to a specific passenger, whose identity is still a mystery. DRI’s joint director at Amritsar said the consignment, which could be worth well over Rs 22 crores in the international drug market, was probably meant to be smuggled to Canada on board Air India’s Amritsar-Birmingham-Toronto flight.
Mr Sondhi’s interrogation later led DRI men to detain one of his key associates, Bittu Atwal, from Jalandhar’s Sunnypura locality.Interestingly, after his arrest, an Akali Dal spokesperson categorically denied that Mr Sondhi represented the party.But this is not the first instance where political functionaries have been associated with narcotics smuggling.Two Akali men arrested from Dera Baba Nanak and Ferozpur earlier were expelled from the party and a Punjab police dossier sent to chief minister Parkash Singh Badal in 2007 contained details of political patronage to the illegal drug trade in Punjab.Interestingly, the Tarn Taran police also detained three drug smugglers with about four kilos of heroin close to the India-Pakistan border this afternoon. The cops were however understandably tightlipped about any political connections that the men may have.