CISF commandant, friend held for planting drugs in car of IAS officer's husband

New Delhi: A 45-year-old commandant with the CISF and his lawyer friend from Aligarh were arrested for allegedly planting drugs in a car belonging to an IAS officer's husband, police said on Thursday.

CISF commandant Ranjan Pratap Singh, who is posted as director of bureau of security (BOS) in the Ministry of External Affairs, and his friend Neeraj Chauhan were charged with criminal conspiracy and under provisions of the NDPS Act, they said.

Around 5pm on Wednesday, a CISF officer received a call about a suspicious car parked inside the CGO complex here.

He immediately alerted CISF security personnel to trace the car's owner. Later, they found that the vehicle's owner worked as a consultant with the Ministry of Information Technology, police said.

CISF personnel searched the car in his presence and during checking, they found 52 small pouches containing 550 gram charas, a senior police officer said.

The car owner was held by police and a case was registered against him under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act.

Police also traced the location of the person who had called the CISF officer and found that he was a street vendor in Mehrauli, the police officer said.

The street vendor told police that two men approached him on Wednesday and took his phone to make an emergency call, he said.

With the help of CCTV footage, police identified the two men and their car had a sticker of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), the senior officer said.

Further investigations revealed that the car belonged to Ranjan Pratap Singh, he said.

Singh first tried to mislead police, but later confessed of planting drugs in the car with the help of his lawyer friend, the police officer added.

During interrogation, Singh told police that he wanted to falsely implicate the IAS officer's husband in a drug peddling case, he said.

Singh said he brought charas from his hometown in Aligarh and involved his friend Chauhan.

He told police that they followed the car of the IAS officer's husband for two days. On Wednesday, Singh and his friend asked a key maker in Lajpat Nagar to open the vehicle and then they planted drugs in his car, police added.