CHENNAI: Prohibition Enforcement Wing (PEW) sleuths on Wednesday seized a lorry carrying more than 12,000 litres of rectified spirit (RS) smuggled from north India to the city for sale in the neighbouring states. Two persons were also arrested and booked under the Bootleggers Act.“The rectified spirit was concealed in wooden boxs aend smuggled in a lorry from New Delhi,” Additional Director General of Police (PEW) C K Gandhirajan told Express on Wednesday. Acting on a tip-off, a team led by ACP Mangayarkarasi intercepted the lorry at Nazarethpet check post on Poonamalle-Bangalore Highway early on Wednesday. The invoice described the goods as shampoo containers sent from New Delhi. However, a search of the vehicle yielded wooden boxes containing 350 white cans, each containing 35 litres of rectified spirit.“A total of 12,250 litres was seized,” Gandhirajan said. “The vehicle was also seized and the total worth of the recovered goods is `20 lakh. Two men were arrested.” Identifying the duo as P Nagarajan (65) and I Rabideen (43), both from Mettupalayam in Coimbatore, the ADGP said they had been booked under the Bootleggers Act. Gandhirajan said 3 lakh litres of rectified spirit were seized in 2011 and 58 notorious smugglers booked under the Bootleggers Act. Rectified spirit, which is highly concentrated ethanol purified by means of repeated distillation, was smuggled from states such as Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Goa and Delhi, where it was illegally produced in large quantities, and brought to Tamil Nadu. “It is then sent to Kerala, where it is mixed with toddy and sold, and to Puducherry, where it is used in the manufacture of spurious liquor.”Describing the modus operandi of the bootleggers, the ADGP said the smuggled consignments were continuously shifted from one vehicle to another at specific points, with different drivers.
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