Chandigarh: Gurwinder alias Afridi landed at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport before dawn on Sunday. An Anti-Gangster Task Force team took him into custody and left for Punjab.
Punjab DGP Gaurav Yadav announced the deportation on X, describing Afridi as a key kingpin of the Doni Bal-Prabh Dassuwal gang. The state government had announced a reward of Rs 5 lakh for information leading to his arrest.
The operation was run as "Operation SHAHID" by the AGTF with the Overseas Fugitive Tracking and Extradition Cell of Punjab's Counter Intelligence wing, supported by central agencies. Tracking and surveillance stretched across countries in Asia, South America and Africa.
Preliminary investigation, police said, indicates that Afridi directed targeted killings, firing incidents tied to extortion and other organised crime in Punjab while operating from abroad. The allegations remain subject to investigation and court proceedings.
Officials said he was detained in Ethiopia on November 6 and deported. The escort team is led by AGTF SP Bikram Brar. Special DGP (AGTF) Pramod Ban and Special DGP (Counter Intelligence) are expected to address a press conference later on Sunday.
Afridi is a resident of Tut village in Tarn Taran district. Police described the operation as the first time Punjab Police has secured the return of a fugitive from an African country.
His movements, as police reconstruct them, run: Mumbai airport to the UAE on March 31, 2025; the UAE to Kenya in April 2026; Kenya to Angola in June 2026; Angola to Ethiopia in November 2026; detention in Ethiopia on November 6.
Investigators allege he left India on a passport obtained through a forged identity — issued in Lucknow on February 12, 2025, using the name and address of a Gorakhpur resident. How that document was obtained, and who helped, is part of the probe.
His name surfaced in the investigation into the August 31, 2022 attack on a church in Thakkarpura village, Tarn Taran, where four masked men allegedly held a security guard at gunpoint, vandalised statues and set the pastor's car on fire.
The DGP credited the Ministry of External Affairs and other central agencies. Further questioning is expected to focus on his network and on the operations he is accused of running from abroad.