Kolkata: Kolkata Howrah and Bidhannagar Police have seized huge quantities of illegal crackers in past 24 hours.
On Tuesday, Kolkata Police informed that from October 14 the police had seized more than 5,000 kg banned crackers. Following that on Tuesday night the police intercepted a goods carrier near Bascule bridge in Port Division. From the vehicles police found huge quantity of banned crackers which were concealed under legal crackers.
Two persons, including the driver were detained. Later, the police found that they were carrying 620 kg illegal crackers and later they were arrested. Around 400 kg banned crackers have been seized from several places across the city. Till Wednesday, Kolkata Police has seized 7,045 kg banned crackers.
Apart from Kolkata Police, Howrah City Police has also conducted drives against illegal crackers.
On Tuesday afternoon, police personnel from Belur police station conducted a raid at Belur Bazar and found 31 kg illegal cracker.
Later, a team from Detective Department conducted another raid at a house in Shibpur's Naskar Para By Lane and found 1,650 kg illegal crackers from a person, identified as Arun Panja. A team from Dasnagar police station raided a house at Kantapukur and found a person, identified as Sajal Patra, had stored 8,583 kg banned cracker. All the accused in three raids were arrested. On Tuesday night police personnel from Lake Town police station found huge quantities of banned crackers in a car during naka-checking.
Sources informed that this year trend of using illegal crackers have increased compared to last year. In the Kolkata Police jurisdiction, till Wednesday the quantity of banned cracker seizure has been found to be almost double than the last year.