Punjab DGP orders quarterly inspection of gun houses

Chandigarh, Nov 18 (IANS) Close on the heels of Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann directing review of all arms licenses to check the gun culture, Director General of Police Gaurav Yadav on Friday ordered a mandatory statewide inspection of shops, premises, and stocks of all gun houses on a quarterly basis.

The DGP issued directions to all police ranges, authorising gazetted officers of the police to inspect the shops, premises, and stocks of all licensed manufactures and dealers under the Arms Act.

Apart from this, the District Superintendent of Police is required to conduct at least one inspection each year, he added.

Punjab has only two per cent of India's population, while it has nearly 10 per cent of the total licensed weapons which stand at nearly 4 lakh, or 13 gun licenses for every 1,000 persons in the state.

There is a huge influx of illegal weapons from across the international border and the inter-state borders from states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

Although the weapons are illegally procured by anti-social elements, the ammunition is mostly pilfered from local gun houses of Punjab.

The DGP said there is an urgent need to enforce the basic policing practice of inspection of gun houses by gazetted police officers for which they are empowered as per the rules, so as to keep a check on the stocks and plug the pilferage of ammunition and misuse of licensed arms.

Earlier, apart from directing a review of all the existing arm licenses in the state, Chief Minister Mann had also ordered that if any licence had been issued to an anti-social element, in the past, then it must be cancelled immediately.

Similarly, it had also been ordered that no new licence should be issued generally in the next three months, adding a licence should be issued only where it is utmost and genuinely required.

The state government had also imposed a blanket ban on the public display of arms and ammunition, including on social media platforms.