A day after the visit of home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde to monitor the functioning of India's first integrated check post (ICP), Pakistan-based smugglers pushed in 105kg heroin valued at around Rs 525 crores in the international market and 500 cartridges of Magnum 397 bore revolver valued at around Rs 2 lakh concealed in cement bags from a goods train that arrived in India from Pakistan on Monday.

This is the highest ever quantity of narcotics sent from Pakistan in a single attempt through international border with Punjab. Deputy commissioner of customs (rail cargo) Vijay Bahadur Singh informed that they got suspicious when one of their staff spotted broken seals of Pakistan customs and railways on one of the doors of a bogey that contained 488 Elephant brand cement bags.

Upon closer scrutiny 4 cement bags were found to be suspicious. "We off loaded the bags and recovered 101 packets weighing around 105 kilogram heroin and 500 cartridges of high-power revolver packed in two bags" he said. "The consignment belonged to a local firm Mohan Communications," he added.

Earlier, custom officials had recovered two consignments of 5 and 7kg heroin respectively, which were also concealed in cement bags. He said the department had begun a probe into the matter.

Interestingly, this happened two days after Indian customs officials had held meeting with their Pakistani counterparts on October 4 and 5. The Pakistani officials had assured the Indian officials that they would implement strict measures to prevent any smuggling attempts.

On Monday, Cabinet minister Bikram Singh Majithia had urged Shinde to install full body scanners at rail cargo. Meanwhile, Border Security Force had also recovered 2 kilogram heroin from near India-Pakistan international boarder in Khalra on the day Shinde visited ICP.

Sources told TOI that investigations were also being carried out about the importer of the cement consignment.