Punjab Police have arrested 8 persons, including a couple, with sophisticated assault rifles, pistols, live cartridges and Heroin in two separate operations in the border district of Amritsar since yesterday.

Dismantling illegal arms and narcotics supply networks, Amritsar Rural Police arrested a family of three, including a husband-wife duo and her brother with an AK-47 and AK-56 assault rifles with cartridges and 10 kilograms of heroin, yesterday.

Inspector General of Police, Border Range, Amritsar, Gurpreet Bhullar revealed that they were running a guava orchard in a village close to India-Pakistan border fence and were using it as a landing and retrieval site for drugs and weapons consignments dropped via drones from across the border.

While today, the Police has apprehended 5 accused with 13 pistols, 22 live cartridges and over 3 kilogram heroin. Mr Bhullar said that all the accused were allegedly linked to foreign-based smugglers and were procuring illegal weapons and narcotics for further supply in the state.