Delhi Nightclub Franchisee Arrested in Rs 21,000 Crore Mundra Drug Smuggling Case
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday arrested Harpreet Singh Talwar, the former franchisee of the Playboy Club nightclub in Delhi, in connection with the seizure of drugs worth Rs 21,000 crore at Mundra port in 2021.
Talwar is accused of colluding with Pakistani and Afghan nationals allegedly linked to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to smuggle heroin into India. The ED conducted searches at five premises belonging to Talwar in the national capital before his arrest.
The case stems from a seizure made by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) on August 13, 2021, when two containers arriving at Mundra port from Kandahar, Afghanistan via Iran's Bandar Abbas port were intercepted. The containers were declared to contain semi-processed talc stones but were found to hold 2,988 kg of heroin.
Following the seizure, further searches led to the recovery of an additional 16 kg of heroin from a godown in Delhi, 10 kg of suspected cocaine, and 11 kg of suspected heroin from a house in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
Talwar had previously been arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) for allegedly being a key member of an international drug syndicate with origins in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The NIA stated that Talwar used his shell entities to import narcotics and facilitate their transport to Delhi-based Afghan nationals involved in the purification and distribution of heroin across several states, including Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh.
He was recently granted bail by the Gujarat High Court but was taken into custody by the ED in connection with the money laundering aspect of the case.
