QUETTA: Customs Quetta, with the assistance of Police, foiled an attempt to smuggle large quantity of smuggled Irani diesel at Qalat.

Customs staff at Lakpas and Qallat police conducted a joint operation and seized four tankers, which led to recovery of 130,000 liters of smuggled diesel. The value of seized goods is Rs70 million.

The transporting vehicles have been seized and drivers were arrested, while an FIR has also been lodged in this regard.

The operation was under taken on the directives of Chief Collector Gul Rehman. On the directives of Collector Irfan Javed and Additional Collector Yasir Kalwar, Deputy Colletor Akbar Jan formed a team led by Superintendent Tariq Sultan and comprising Inspectors Rehmatullah Khan, Bashir Khan, Ishaq George and others.

Collector Irfan Javed made it clear that from July 01 onwards, any person claiming to be the owner of smuggled goods, vehicles and non-custom-paid vehicles would also be booked in FIRs and arrested.

It was also known that a lock-up would be setup at Custom House so that persons arrested could be kept in lock-up before the auction. Moreover, sepoys trained by Army are being posted at auction.

It may be mentioned here that government envisages large inflows of revenue through curbing smuggling and officials believe that government could collect hundreds of billions of rupees through curbing smuggling.

In line with the directives of PM Imran Khan, all law enforcement and security agencies are rendering all assistance to Customs in its campaign against smuggling.