Punjab Police claimed to have busted an inter-state racket with the arrest of three persons involved in the smuggling of opium via an ambulance, on Sunday.

Police seized eight kg of opium from an ambulance on the Ambala-Chandigarh highway on Saturday, said Mohali Senior Superintendent of Police Vivek Sheel Soni while addressing the media here. The accused had used the ambulance 10-12 times for smuggling narcotics in the past, he said.

But their recent attempt to smuggle opium by the same means was unearthed by the Punjab police on Saturday when a team posted near Dappar village stopped an ambulance coming from the Ambala side. The police found two people inside the vehicle, one posing as a patient, lying on a stretcher-like seat, and another sitting by him. The third one was driving the vehicle.

When it was checked, police did not find any member of a medical team or oxygen cylinder, or even the first-aid kit in the vehicle, which piqued their suspicion.

They did thorough checking of the ambulance, and came to find eight kg of opium hidden inside the pillow being used by the person posing as the patient, said police.

The three accused were identified as Ravi Srivastava, from Uttar Pradesh, Harinder Sharma, a resident of Mohali, and Ankush, a resident of Chandigarh, said police. A case under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 has been registered against them, they said.

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