Punjab Police on Sunday brought back Gurwinder Singh, better known by his alias Afridi, from Ethiopia, closing a ten-month international manhunt that had stretched across three continents and ending the fugitive's run as one of the state's most wanted gang leaders.
The deportation, secured under an operation codenamed Operation SHAHID, marks the first time the Punjab Police has succeeded in bringing back a fugitive from an African country, and officials presented it as a significant breakthrough in the state's continuing campaign against organised gang crime.
Afridi, described by police as a key kingpin of the Doni Bal-Prabh Dassuwal gang, arrived at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi early on Sunday morning, where officers of the Anti-Gangster Task Force were waiting to take him into custody.
Photographs shared by the Punjab Police showed the gangster flanked by task force officers at the airport shortly after his arrival, bringing to an end a period in which he had directed criminal operations in Punjab from abroad while remaining beyond the reach of investigators at home.
Announcing the operation, Director General of Police Gaurav Yadav said the Anti-Gangster Task Force of the Punjab Police had carried out the deportation in coordination with the Overseas Fugitive Tracking and Extradition Cell of Counter Intelligence, Punjab, and with the support of central agencies.
The operation, he said, had involved sustained intelligence gathering, surveillance and tracking across several countries in Asia, South America and Africa, conducted in close coordination with national and international agencies before Ethiopian authorities agreed to hand him over.
Afridi is wanted in 35 criminal cases in Punjab, five of them sensational murder cases registered in the state over the past two years. Police said the cases included the murder of Aam Aadmi Party sarpanch Rajwinder Singh, also known as Raj Talwandi, in October 2024, and the killing of a 12-year-old boy, Gursewak Singh, in March 2025.
He is also wanted in connection with the murder of Vicky Chugh in March 2025, the killing of Jaswant Singh in May 2025, and the murder of Congress block president Gurmel Singh in September 2025. Beyond those five cases, the wider list of 35 includes the murders of Aam Aadmi Party leaders and rival gangsters, as well as cases linked to extortion and organised crime.
The Punjab Government had announced a reward of five lakh rupees for information leading to his arrest, a measure that reflected how seriously the state viewed his continued freedom. According to police investigations, Afridi had been directing targeted killings, extortion-related firing incidents and other organised criminal activity in Punjab from abroad, using overseas handlers and local operatives to carry out attacks while he himself remained outside the country.
The Doni Bal-Prabh Dassuwal gang, of which Afridi is described as a leading figure, is one of several organised crime syndicates that have operated in Punjab in recent years, often with members based abroad and networks that cross state and national boundaries.
Police in the state have repeatedly said that such gangs sustain themselves through extortion demands made to businessmen, transporters and other targets, backed by shootings and threats, and through the proceeds of other criminal activity. The deportation of a senior figure from such a gang is therefore presented by the force as more than a single arrest: it is intended as a signal to other fugitives operating from foreign soil that distance no longer guarantees safety.
The mechanics of the operation underline how far Punjab Police's reach has extended in recent years. The Overseas Fugitive Tracking and Extradition Cell, a specialised unit within Counter Intelligence, has been tasked with tracing gangsters who have fled abroad and building the legal and diplomatic case for their return.
In Afridi's case, the trail passed through countries in Asia, South America and Africa before investigators located him in Ethiopia, in the Horn of Africa, a jurisdiction from which Indian authorities have rarely secured a deportation. Police sources said the fact that the deportation was achieved at all, let alone from an African country, was a first for the Punjab Police and reflected the sustained effort put into the case over ten months.
The timing of the arrest also matters for the force's broader record. Punjab has seen a series of high-profile deportations and arrests of gangsters from abroad in recent years, including the return of operatives from Malaysia and other countries, as police and central agencies have tightened cooperation with foreign counterparts.
Each such case has been used to argue that the state's anti-gangster strategy, built around the Anti-Gangster Task Force and intelligence-led operations, is producing results that were not possible when fugitives could simply disappear overseas.
For the families of the victims named in the cases against Afridi, the return opens the way for prosecution in Indian courts, where the cases have been pending while he remained abroad.
The murder of a sarpanch, the killing of a 12-year-old child and the other killings attributed to the gang had each drawn public attention in the districts where they took place, and the fact that the accused was directing operations from another continent had added to the sense of frustration among those affected.
His arrival in Delhi means that the legal process in those cases can now move forward, with investigators expected to seek his custody for questioning about the wider network he is alleged to have run.
The operation also fits into a wider pattern of Punjab Police action against gangster networks that operate across borders. In June this year, the force brought back two operatives linked to the banned Khalistan Zindabad Force from Malaysia, in a case involving the targeting of railway infrastructure in the state.
That deportation, like this one, was presented as evidence that international cooperation against fugitives is improving, even when the accused are based in countries far from India.
Questions will now turn to what Afridi tells investigators about the gang's structure, its funding and its overseas support network, and whether his arrest leads to further action against associates still at large. Police said he had been directing targeted killings and extortion-related firing from abroad, and the information he holds about the gang's operations could prove valuable in dismantling the network.
For now, the force is treating the deportation itself as the achievement, and the first time it has secured the return of a fugitive from an African country as a marker of how far its international operations have come.
The case also illustrates the changing geography of Punjab's gang problem. Where fugitives once fled to a small number of familiar destinations, investigators now find themselves tracking suspects through multiple continents, including countries in South America and Africa that were not previously part of the story.
Operation SHAHID, the codename given to the hunt for Afridi, reflects that reality: a manhunt that began in Punjab and ended, ten months later, at an airport in New Delhi with the accused in custody.
As the legal proceedings begin, the focus will shift from the pursuit to the prosecution, and to whether the evidence gathered against Afridi in the 35 cases is sufficient to secure convictions. The police, for their part, have made clear that they regard the deportation as a message as much as an arrest: that fugitives who order killings and extortion from abroad will be pursued wherever they go, for as long as it takes.
(Reporting based on The Tribune and Hindustan Times.)