RAWALPINDI, Aug 5: Six persons, including three policemen, were arrested in connection with the smuggling of 5kg narcotics (charas) from Peshawar.

The three policemen arrested were posted at Race Course police station, while search for their accomplice, a head constable, has been launched. A car was also seized from the suspects.

Superintendent of Police (SP) Waheedur Rehman, who led the raid, revealed that they had been following information from the City Police, who had notified them of a ‘money deal’ between a gang of smugglers and some policemen at Chauntra.

He said the smugglers – two women and a man – were detained by the policemen at an unknown location. They had allegedly been bargaining with the drug carriers for their safe release.

SP Waheedur Rehman, who is in charge of Saddar circle in which Chauntra falls, said he intervened because he had information about arrest of the drug traffickers by Chauntra police.

However, later it was found out that the accused had been detained by Race Course police.

During the raid, the three policemen – Natik Shakeel, Babar Shah and Saeed Akhtar – were arrested. However, head constable Ishtiaq Ahmed managed to escape with a large amount of narcotics.

A raid was conducted at the head constable’s residence but police were neither able to apprehend him nor recover the narcotics. The arrested women were identified as G.Q. and S.B.

G.Q., a resident of Rawalpindi, had also been arrested previously on similar charges but was later released.

The six individuals have been booked under the Anti-Narcotics Act.

However, according to sources close to the investigation, the arrested policemen denied the charges against them, claiming that they had in fact seized a large quantity of drugs from the two women and a man, who had allegedly complained to a senior police officer against the four policemen about their detention.

The sources added that the complaint to the police officer led to the arrest of the three men and registration of a drug trafficking case against them, despite the fact that the drugs were recovered from the other three individuals.