Chandigarh, Oct 17 (IANS): Punjab Police have averted possible target killings with the arrest of four operatives of a terror module backed by Pakistan-based terrorist Harwinder Singh Rinda and operated by the US-based gangster Harpreet Singh a.k.a. Happy Passia, Director General of Police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav said on Tuesday.

The arrested individuals have been identified as Vikramjit Singh, Bawa Singh, Gurkirpal Singh and Amanat Gill.

The police have also recovered one .32 bore pistol along with 10 cartridges from their possession.

Yadav said following intelligence inputs about Rinda and Happy Passia planning to target some prominent persons in the state by"hiring two shooters to accomplish this task", police teams from SAS Nagar launched a special operation and nabbed two accused -- Vikramjit and Bawa Singh.

Preliminary investigations revealed that gangster Happy Passia had a deal with accused Vikramjit to pay Rs 15 lakh to carry out target killing, he said, adding Vikramjit had also conducted the recce of the target in the last week of September.

The DGP said follow-up investigations suggested the pistol and cartridges for Vikramjit were arranged by Passia through his local associates -- Gurkirpal Singh and Amanat Gill.

"Following the disclosures of the accused, police have also nabbed Gurkirpal Singh and Amanat Gill, while Hari Singh managed to flee to abroad," he added.