In an early morning operation, Punjab Police on Saturday busted aninter-state sex racket active in Ludhiana with arrest of 14 persons including10 girls alongwith the lady kingpin already on bail in similar case who used totarget needy girls out of jobs due to Covid lockdowns from city and outsideforcing them into prostitution.
Antecedents of girls found involved in the fleshtrade have been traced back to as far as Nepal, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh,Haryana, Uttrakhand, Chandigarh & Amritsar and further investigations areon to unearth the complete area of their operations, ADCP-4 Ludhiana RupinderKaur Sran who led the operation. We have also recovered restricted drugsEtizolam and Escitalopram Oxalate tablets which are only allowed on prescription and the accused are being interrogated to ascertain thesource of their supply, the ADCP added.
Initial investigations have also revealed thenames of similar operatives in other cities with whom the main accused and hergirls were in touch to widen their net, Sran said adding all these angles werebeing probed and more arrests were likely.
Twenty tablets of Etizolam and EscitalopramOxalate tablets besides 5 pieces of Spanisshe Fliege sex drops were seized.Seven mobile phones, 28 packets of condoms, besides Rs 3630 and two liquorbottles have also been seized from the spot.
Commissioner of Police Ludhiana Rakesh Agrawal hadconstituted a special team under ADCP Ludhiana IV Rupinder Kaur Sran, with SHOMohammad Jamil its member. An FIR No. 46, dated 6-03-2021, u/s 3,4 and 5 of theImmoral Traffic Prevention Act 1956, PS Tibba has been registered in this case.
Giving details about the raid, ADCP Rupinder KaurSran said that a tip-off was received about flesh trade activity being run bythe accused and her movements were kept under watch. The main accused hasbeen identified as Manjit Kaur alias Pammi aunty resident of street number 10New Subhash Nagar and was also arrested in a similar case lodged at PoliceStation Jodhewal in 2018. Three men were also arrested from the house duringthe raid who had come there as customers.
She was on bail now and was running the illegalactivity from her house only by luring young needy girls into prostitution.Modus operandi was to engage girls once into her net to target more needy girlsout of work due to Covid lockdown and force them into prostitution.
Of those arrested, one girl from Delhi was lured into the tradebecause she could not repay the loan she had taken from a relative to make endsmeet during Covid, while another girl was picked up by the main accused from acity Gurdwara she was visiting at the pretext of job offer. These girls backhome used to tell their family members that they were working in a factory orperforming in marriage parties, Sran added.