6 held in PDS rice smuggling case

The Civil Supplies- CID police have busted a rice smuggling racket here on Wednesday by arresting six person while they were trying to smuggle PDS rice.

Acting on a tip-off, a team of cops led by Inspector of CS-CID, Salem,  P Kennady and SI S Ponraj, inspected a ration shop at Vengarai near Paramathi-Velur during the wee hours of Wednesday and found tonnes of PDS rice being loaded into a goods vehicle.

The salesman of the ration shop R Radhakrishnan of West Street, Vengarai, was nabbed along with load men, R Balasubramani of Karur and A Solairaja of Bodinaickenpatti, Namakkal.

Nearly 2.5 tonnes of PDS rice was seized from them, the official informed.

Following the information given by the three arrested persons during interrogation, the cops swooped down on a poultry farm at Keelparali and seized another 1 tonne of PDS rice.

The owner of the poultry farm, R Kanthasamy, 38, was arrested by the team.

Moreover, the CS-CID police men nabbed the leader of the smuggling racket, P Duraisamy of Tiruchengode-Namakkal Road, here, along with a lorry owner-cum-driver R Sakthivel of Nallipalayam near here, the official told. Two vehicles, which were used for smuggling the rice, were also seized by the police.