Amritsar: Officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) Sunday arrested an elderly non-resident Indian (NRI) couple from the Amritsar-Birmingham-Toronto flight that was about to take-off and seized from them 3.7 kg of heroin.

The drug consignment was recovered from the couple's luggage when the Air India flight was about to take-off from the Rajasansi airport here. The heroin is worth millions of rupees in the international market.

Raminder Singh Nagra, 60, and his wife Harjinder Kaur, 56, were arrested by DRI officials and were ccused of violating provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985.

They had been cleared by customs and immigration officials and had boarded the flight when the DRI officials entered the plane and took the couple away.

The doors of the aircraft were closed and the flight was about to move for taking off, when the couple was deboarded and the DRI officials arrested them, airport officials said.

The pilot of the aircraft was asked to return to the bay.

As the couple was off-loaded from the aircraft, the flight was allowed to leave as per schedule. The couple was headed to Toronto in Canada and hold Canadian passports.

DRI officials said investigations revealed that the couple, from a village near Nakodar town in Jalandhar district, had made several trips between Canada and India in past years.

On being questioned, the couple told the DRI officials that their luggage was packed by their son in the village and they had no idea about the narcotics.

 

Source : IANS