Trucks carry illegal sand seized
KANPUR: : In one of the biggest crackdowns on illegal mining, 372 truck-full of sand and red sand were seized in Etawah by the police in a coordinated operation on Friday.
All the trucks had entered from the Chambal side of Madhya Pradesh and were scheduled to deliver the material in different parts of the state. Mining is on a hold in Uttar Pradesh since the BJP government has taken over to make the process transparent.
The police have detained 10 people who were responsible for letting the trucks pass through different checkpoints, which are managed by the police and road transport officers. SSP Etawah Vabhav Krishna said the owners of the trucks had been summoned.
The material loaded on the truck was illegally mined in Madhya Pradesh and no truckers could furnish any relevant documents, he said.
Last month, Krishna had carried out clandestine operations. In one such raids, policemen in Jaswant Nagar even asked him for bribe to let his sand laden truck pass. Many policemen and
THE TRUCKS HAD AN UNDERSTANDING WITH POLICE AND RTO IN BORDERING BHIND, FROM WHERE THEY EASILY GOT INTO ETAWAH UNCHECKED.
RTO employees were arrested in the follow-up action and nearly 30 trucks seized.
Since then 56 persons, including 26 police drivers, have been transferred out of the district for their links with the mining mafia. “It is part of an organized racket, the police will invoke provisions of Gangster Act on the people arrested,” Krishna said.
The trucks had an understanding with police and RTO in bordering Bhind, from where they easily got into Etawah unchecked. The drivers would break the journey in Etawah, where exit points were manned and vehicles checked.
wThe trucks would then move towards Auraiya and then Kanpur Dehat only after the Etawah police wound up the checking for the day.