Jalandhar, October 29: The Anti Narcotics Task Force (ANTF) of the Punjab Police has arrested former Assistant Inspector General (AIG) Rachhpal Singh in connection with a 2017 fake heroin seizure case, sources said on Tuesday.
The arrest, carried out by the Jalandhar unit of the ANTF, comes after years of investigation and multiple judicial inquiries into the case. Police have secured Singh’s remand from a local court, though officials have not yet issued an official confirmation of the arrest.
The case traces back to August 3, 2017, when Balwinder Singh was picked up by the then Special Task Force (STF) of Amritsar from Civil Hospital Patti and later booked under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. The STF claimed to have recovered one kilogram of heroin from him, alleging it had been smuggled from Pakistan.
However, subsequent inquiries found the seizure to be fabricated. Three others were also implicated in the same case.
Balwinder Singh later moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court, seeking an independent probe after a supplementary chargesheet was filed against him. Investigations revealed discrepancies between call detail records (CDRs) and CCTV footage, which contradicted the STF’s claims.
In November 2019, the High Court directed then DGP (Bureau of Investigation) Pramod Ban to conduct an inquiry. The DGP’s findings, submitted in December 2020, pointed to inconsistencies, citing evidence from CCTV footage, call data, and location details that questioned the legitimacy of the 2017 operation.
The case was later transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in January 2021, after the High Court observed serious lapses in the STF’s handling of the matter. The CBI’s probe found that the seized heroin had originally been recovered from Gurjant Singh alias Sonu, but was falsely shown as recovered from Balwinder Singh. Gurjant was allegedly released, while Balwinder was framed with fabricated evidence.
Rachhpal Singh, who had held a senior position in the STF at the time, was allegedly part of the team accused of manipulating the records and staging the seizure. The arrest marks a major development in a case that has long raised concerns over police excesses and misuse of anti-drug operations in Punjab.
