The Fatehgarh Police on Wednesday said it is not targeting Olympian bronze medalist boxer Vijender Singh, but the international cartel involved in drug trade.
"Our case is of smuggling of drugs by big smugglers. We are focusing on the international level cartel, in which drug peddlers are involved. Even some foreigners are involved in it," Hardial Singh Mann, SSP, Fatehgarh Sahib said on Wednesday.
For the last one month, Punjab police has been making one claim after another involving Vijender after Anoop Singh kahlon, the main accused in the case along with his driver Rocky, were arrested by Fatehgarh Police on March 3 last.
Now, police has come to the conclusion that both boxers Vijender and Ram Singh were small fish in the big drug trade network. SSP, Fatehgarh Sahib said both the boxers were casual consumers.
Meanwhile, police said that after the recovery of 5 kg 'Ice' and 90 kg Pseudophedrine drugs from the premises of Ravicharan Singh alias Ravi Deol, brother-in-law of boxer Ram Singh, deeper association of the boxer with the smugglers has surfaced. As such, he has been arrested by the Fatehgarh Sahib police for interrogation.
HS Dhillon, ADGP, Punjab police said Vijender's name surfaced only "when we saw the registration certificate of the car parked outside Kahlon's house at Zirakpur and the car was found registered in the name of Archana Beniwal, wife of Vijender."
Dhillon also made it clear that "Vijender's name was never connected with smuggling or conniving actively in the trade. However, our duty is to unearth the truth and we will present the case with proof in the court."
SSP, Fatehgarh Sahib, who is investigating the case, also said that the "car has no relevance in this case." However, we are focusing on Ravi Deol, who is an associate of Anoop Singh Kahlon and Jagdish Singh Bhola, who are at large.
"We have arrested 15 persons in this connection and double the number (30) have been identified, who will be nabbed soon," said Mann.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED), Jalandhar, on April 2 had also registered a money laundering case against NRI drug dealer Kahlon in connection with narcotics recovered from his Zirakpur house last month.