By Nayak Paudel
Kathmandu, Mar. 7: On last Thursday evening, a patrolling team of security force led by Police Inspector Kamal Khadka from Area Police Office, Belauri, in Kanchanpur district was in Ward 7 of that municipality when they got attacked by a group of smugglers. The team was surveilling the Nepal-India border at the time.
According to the police, they were tipped off about a group of four smugglers entering Nepal with several contraband items stockpiled in multiple bags. No sooner had the group seen the police, it opened fire at latter.
The police retaliation resulted in the killing of one of the smugglers named Govinda Singh, 20, a resident of the district of Pilibhit in Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Hit by a bullet in his chest, he succumbed to his injuries while undergoing treatment at Ishan Memorial Hospital, Belauri.
Three others fled the scene leaving the bags at the spot. Police Constable Bir Bahadur Saud also got injured in his leg during the skirmish.
Upon opening the bags, the police found two machines used to print counterfeit currency, dozens of papers cut in the size of Indian Currency (IC) of 500 denomination, illicit drugs -- 3.54 grams black powder, 65.89 gram brown sugar and 24.86 white sugar -- along with a knife, a tape and a mobile phone concealed in the bags.
That incident has shown that cross-border smuggling has become a headache for the police. “We have been grappling with cross-border smuggling and the crimes related to it, but we now have intensified our border-surveillance, in coordination with other security bodies, to tackle it,” said Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Basanta Bahadur Kunwar, spokesperson for the Central Police.
He added that the fact that smugglers opening fire at the police showed that they have amplified their preparation as well as capability to confront the police.
The Police have suspected that the group was printing fake ICs in Nepal with the purpose of smuggling them to India.
“We have arrested several people with counterfeit ICs in the past as well. The process of making that currency in Nepal and smuggling them to India and smuggling counterfeit Nepali currency printed in India to Nepal seems to be going on,” said SSP Kunwar.
Pharmaceutical drugs, including brown sugar, are highly smuggled to Nepal via India. It has been found that many Nepalis enter India to consume such drugs there.
Since Nepal and India shares a long open border, surveilling it round the clock is a herculean task. To make things worse, the uptick in the smuggling activities has added to the challenges facing the security personnel who are manning the border security posts.
The border outposts and police offices are located at a long distance, and smugglers take advantage of it. Some get arrested; many others manage to get away.
“The smugglers have improved their capability of tackling the threat of security personnel. The onus now is on us to upgrade our capability as well. The government need to take this emerging threat seriously and improve its security policies,” said SSP Kunwar.