Illegal bar near Army cantonment closed down: Police

An illegal bar being run close to Shikargarh cantonment area near Jodhpur has been closed down on a complaint by the Army Intelligence Unit that it was being visited surreptitiously by jawans who may be blurting out sensitive information to civilians under the influence of liquor, police said on Saturday. The bar was seized on Friday midnight when the police also arrested its salesman and confiscated 47 bottles of liquor, they said. The arrested salesman was identified as Pemaram, 47.

The Army intelligence sources said the bar had been entertaining Army jawans along with civilians for quite some time and it was learnt that these jawans may be sharing information related to the Army with civilians under the influence of liquor. This area is very sensitive in terms of Army bases as well as the Army's deployment and operations, with jawans having all the sensitive information. The possibility of accessing this information from them by some unscrupulous element cannot be ruled out," they said.

The Army jawans or any of its personnel is not allowed to visit such bars and have drinks with civilians. If they do so, the chances of unscrupulous elements targeting and befriending them and extracting strategic information from them are quite high," the sources said. Though there is no confirmed instance of sharing of any information by jawans with civilians while having their drinks, its possibility cannot be ruled out, they said. Besides this, there are many ISI agents acting as sleeper cells and roaming around in search of weak links in the entire western region and such links could easily be tapped by sharing drinks," he said.