NIA arrests main shooter in Mohali RPG attack last year
Deepak Ranga (23), a resident of Surakpur in Haryana’s Jhajjar district, was arrested from Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur on Wednesday morning, an NIA spokesperson said.
New Delhi: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Wednesday arrested the main shooter in the rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attack on the Punjab police intelligence headquarters in Mohali in May last year, agency officers said.
Deepak Ranga (23), a resident of Surakpur in Haryana’s Jhajjar district, was arrested from Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur on Wednesday morning, an NIA spokesperson said.
Ranga had been absconding since the RPG attack last year that sent the alarm bells through the security apparatus in the border state.
A statement issued by the federal anti-terror agency said Ranga is a close associate of Canada-based gangster-turned-terrorist Lakhbir Singh Sandhu alias Landa and Pakistan-based gangster-turned-terrorist Harvinder Singh Sandhu alias Rinda.
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“Apart from his involvement in the RPG attack (on May 9 last year), Ranga has been involved in a number of other violent terrorist and criminal offences, including violent killings,” the NIA spokesperson said. “He has been actively receiving terror funds and logistical support from Rinda and Landa.”
In October last year, the Delhi Police arrested a minor boy, a resident of Faizabad district in Uttar Pradesh, for his involvement in the RPG attack.
According to the Punjab Police, both Ranga and the minor boy had hurled an RPG at the state police’s intelligence headquarters in Mohali, leaving a portion of the building damaged.
NIA took up the case suo motu (on its own) on September 20 after it emerged that terrorist outfits and terror elements based abroad were operating in tandem with leaders and members of organised criminal gangs operating in northern states of the country to commit targeted killings and violent criminal acts.
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“It had also emerged that the terror-gangster-drug smuggler network was also engaged in smuggling terrorist hardware, such as arms, ammunition explosives, IEDs etc across border through a widespread inter-state network of gun runners, illegal arms and ammunition manufacturers and suppliers and explosive traffickers,” the spokesperson said.
NIA has registered three cases against these “terror-gangster-drug smuggler” networks and arrested 19 leaders and members of various organised criminal gangs, two arms suppliers and one big financier connected with the network under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
On January, Canada-based gangster Arsh Dalla was designated as an “individual terrorist” by the Union ministry of home affairs (MHA), the spokesperson said, adding: “Further action to dismantle the terror-gangster-smuggler nexus and infrastructure would be intensified in the near future.”
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