Rich Haul Of Illegal Arms Recovered From Manipur Congress MLA’s Residence

A considerable cache of illegal weapons, including arms stolen from the state police, were recovered from a Manipur Congress legislator's house in state capital Imphal on Tuesday evening. The raid was conducted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), which is probing the theft of 56 pistols and ammunition from the 2nd Manipur Rifles battalion earlier this year.

According to this India Today report, the MLA, Yamthong Haokip, was present in his residence at the time of the raid, but complained of chest pain and was admitted to a hospital.  Apart from one of the stolen 9mm pistols, the NIA also discovered other weapons in his house. These are a US-made Beretta whose arms license had expired, an unlicensed Italian-made pistol, one double barrel gun with an expired license and one single barrel gun without any identification. The NIA team also recovered a lot of different types of ammunition from the legislator's house.

The Manipur government had purchased 570 9mm pistols in 2014. The theft of 56 pistols and 58 magazines from the armoury of the 2nd Manipur Rifles (a state police commando force) was discovered in March and the case handed over to the NIA. The NIA, in course of its investigation, arrested nine persons and recovered three of the stolen pistols. Custodial interrogation of the accused revealed the involvement of Haokip.