: Punjab Police arrested a man, who had contact with ‘extremists based abroad’ and had received a large shipment of arms from them to carry out criminal activities on their instructions, from the region of Kathunangal here.

Acting on a tip off, the State Special Operation Cell (SSOC) wing of the Punjab Police arrested Amarinder Singh alias Ginni from the village of Bath in Tarn Taran at a barricade in Kathunangal as he came from his village on Thursday evening and recovered a .9 mm pistol, two magazines and 20 live ammunition in his possession.

Police say the accused was arrested as he planned to commit a crime at the behest of his overseas-based dog handlers.

“Our investigation so far suggests that the overseas-based entities could be radical extremists, who could incite Amarinder. But we will be able to tell exactly once our investigation is complete,” an SSOC official said.

Sources said a case against Amarinder has been registered under Section 25 of the Weapons Act and 120-B (Criminal Conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) at SSOC Amritsar Police Station.

“The secret informant told the police that Amarinder had been in contact with several foreign-based entities and, on their instructions, he had also received a large shipment of weapons. Amarinder planned to commit a crime on the instructions of his foreign masters,” a source said.

“Amarinder was using the Telegraph app on his mobile phone to establish contact with his foreign-based entities. So far, our investigation has revealed that Amarinder had received weapons from his foreign handlers. A .9mm pistol that “he received a few days ago was smuggled in. Our technical teams are working to verify the identity of overseas-based entities using mobile numbers from Amarinder’s phone,” an SSOC official said. , on condition of anonymity.

He said: “Amarinder confessed that he received the weapons free of charge and wanted to use them in accordance with further instructions from the handlers. He also wanted to go after his own relatives, who disagreed with him. We suspect that Amarinder received more arms and ammunition from its overseas-based handlers.

On April 18, the Amritsar SSOC had arrested two close associates of gangster-turned-terrorist Arshdeep Singh, alias Arsh Dalla, and claimed to have thwarted possible efforts by foreign-based anti-national elements to disturb the peace and tranquility of Punjab. .