
SURAT, Feb 9: About 1400 bottles of Indian Made Foreign Liquor IMFL worth Rs 75,000 were seized in two separate raids conducted by the district police on Monday night. While the police arrested a woman bootlegger, Hansaben Raju Babhubhai, three men managed to escape and have been declared absconders.
The three accused have been identified as Babu Madrasi, Ashok Magan Patel and Dalpat Narsinh Dodiya. Madrasi, booked under the Prohibition Act earlier too, is already an absconder on police records.
According to the Bardoli police, Hansaben and Babu Madrasi had brought 192 bottles of beer, 11 bottles of Royal Special Whisky and another 768 180-ml bottles of liquor from Daman, packed it in sacks and kept it in Rayam village of the taluka.
Based on this information, a raid was conducted on Monday night and the liquor worth Rs 50,000 was seized the police said, adding that while they managed to arrest Hansaben, Madrasi managed to escape.
In another raid conducted by the Mahuva police, during the early hours of Tuesday, 35 bottles of Royal Deluxe Whisky worth Rs 24,000 were recovered from a sugarcane field. Mahuva PSI J K Jhala, who lodged a case later, said that the bottles were hidden by Patel and Dodiya when they sensed the arrival of a police team. Both are since absconding.
The police have registered cases in the respective police stations under sections 66 1 b, 65 ae 81 and 116 of the Prohibition Act.