Rs 6.5L IMFL seized from farmhouse

AHMEDABAD: A huge liquor consignment of Rs 6.5 lakh was seized from a farmhouse near SG Highway on Monday. A surveillance squad of the director general of police, Gujarat, raided Rupali farm house in Greenwoods resort campus after a tip-off and seized 182 crates of Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) from the house. Police later said that the consignment belongs to a gang of bootleggers — Manish Patel, Vasant Khatri and Yasin and they used to smuggle IMFL from Rajasthan.
The trio seemed to have got prior intimation of the raid and had escaped the farm house before the police team reached. "The three accused have several complaints under the Prohibition Act against them. They have also been booked under PASA," said police.
Police inspector RS Sindhi and Dipak Vyas had received a tip-off that huge liqour consignment was kept in the farm house. Trucks from Rajasthan would carry liqour to farmhouses on highways connecting Gujarat and Rajasthan and from there the trio would fetch IMFL in smaller cars to avoid raising any suspicion. However, the tip-off put the cops in a dilemma. "The farm houses belong to rich and connected people. And, the one which was raided belonged to — Tejas Patel. We are yet to find out who he is and how is he connected to the bootleggers," said police sources.
The cops kept surveillance on the farm house for two days and found that the other bootleggers waited at the ringroad connecting the farm house to the highway. Then, any one of the gang members would drive up to the house and load the liqour bottles and give it to the smaller bootleggers. This was done as to maintain secrecy on where the stuff was kept, said police officials.
However, when on Monday morning the police team reached the farmhouse in a private vehicle, it was deserted. "The liquor consignment was hidden in the outhouse. We are trying to ascertain Tejas Patel's identity and his role in the illegal smuggling," said police officials.