The Sashastra Seema Bal on Saturday arrested Satish Nainwal, younger brother of BJP MLA of Ranikhet, Pramod Nainwal, from Banbasa in Champawat district of Uttarakhand on the charge of illegally transporting cartridges from Nepal to India.
Nainwal is an MLA from Ranikhet in Almora district of Uttarakhand. The SSB said that its 57 Battalion was doing a routine check along the Indo-Nepal border when they recovered 40 live cartridges from the car in which Satish, 40, and his driver, Sher Singh, 47, were returning from Nepal to India.
Manohar Lal, a commandant of the SSB, told local reporters: “We had a tip-off that someone would pass through the border with some illegal items. We deployed some officers there in the morning to check every person and vehicle. There were 40 cartridges of 7.65 mm in Nainwal’s car and they were transporting it to the country illegally. There were also other prohibited items in the car. We have booked them under the Arms Act and arrested them. A team is interrogating them.”
“We keep a close watch on the activities of those who cross the border and arrest them immediately,” he added.
The BJP MLA told reporters in Dehradun that his brother committed a “minor mistake”. “He has a licensed weapon but was carrying the cartridges by mistake. We are looking at the legal aspect of the case. It is a minor mistake he committed,” said Pramod.
Four months ago, Sandeep Khulbe — panchayat chief of Seem Micholi village in Ranikhet — had registered a police case against Satish and nephew Sandeep Vadhani for attacking and intimidating him. However, Satish had also filed a counter-FIR the same day and rubbished the allegation.
Pramod also found himself in a spot around the same time when a purported audio had gone viral in which a voice resembling that of the MLA was intimidating someone over the phone.
State Congress president Karan Mahara said: “The SSB has arrested the BJP MLA’s brother but the MLA is trying to underplay the crime. We hope that the security agencies will act impartially because it is a matter of national security. We need to know what they had planned to do with these illegal cartridges.”
