Maharashtra crime: Liquor worth Rs 55 lakh found stored illegally seized from shops, two held

Maharashtra crime: Excise Department arrested two persons from Bhiwandi in Thane for allegedly illegally storing and trying to sell liquor worth Rs 55.22 lakh

Maharashtra crime: The Maharashtra Excise Department officials arrested two persons from Bhiwandi in Thane district for allegedly illegally storing and trying to sell Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL) worth Rs 55.22 lakh, an official said on Wednesday, reported the PTI.

According to the news agency, the authorities seized more than 5,200 IMFL bottles during raids conducted on Tuesday at the shops run by the two accused, he said.

"Officials of the excise department's flying squad of Konkan division conducted raids at the shops in Angaon of Bhiwandi-Wada road, and seized a huge stock of IMFL worth Rs 55,22,400," Superintendent of Excise in Thane, Nilesh Sangde, said, as per the PTI.

"Two shopkeepers were arrested for illegally stocking and trying to sell the liquor...A total of 5,288 liquor bottles were seized from the shops," he said, according to the PTI.

The arrested shopkeepers were identified as Ramendrakumar Tiwari (48) and Riyaz Ali Avid (55), the official said.

Meanwhile, last month, Maharashtra excise department on Monday seized Indian-Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) worth Rs 59.48 lakh being transported to Mumbai in a truck and arrested three men hailing from Madhya Pradesh, an official said, according to the PTI.

Based on a tip-off, a flying squad of the excise department's Konkan division laid a trap and intercepted a truck near Turbhe railway station in Navi Mumbai, inspector Dighambar Shewale told the PTI.

In May this year, the Excise department had confiscated a consignment of banned Codeine cough syrup from Reay Road, and arrested an accused in the matter. 

The Vigilance Squad had formed a team of officers had conducted a raid and seized the materials from the suspect.  

Sources in the Excise department had earlier said that the suspect, in his early 40s, had been allegedly running the racket from an illegal shanty near an under-construction railway bridge at Reay Road in Mumbai.

The suspect had concealed the bottles of banned cough syrup at different places along the railway tracks and the Excise officials had to dig out the premises. They have recovered 170 bottles, each 100 ml, worth Rs 1.10 lakh.

(with PTI inputs

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