Suspended Punjab Police DIG Harcharan Singh Bhullar told the Income Tax department his total annual income for assessment year 2025-26 was Rs 45.95 lakh. The CBI then walked through his Chandigarh house and recovered Rs 7.36 crore in cash, gold and silver worth Rs 2.32 crore, 26 luxury watches including Rolex and Rado, four firearms, documents relating to over 50 immovable properties and five luxury vehicles. On April 27, 2026, the Enforcement Directorate ran a fresh round of PMLA searches at 11 more premises in Chandigarh, Ludhiana, Patiala, Nabha and Jalandhar, and seized another Rs 1.4 crore in cash plus 'incriminating documents.' Bhullar's actual job, as DIG of the Ropar Range, was supervising the financial integrity of every police officer under him.
Bhullar was arrested on October 16, 2025 after a scrap dealer told the CBI he was being shaken down for Rs 8 lakh through a middleman to settle a criminal case. The arrest produced what investigators describe as one of the largest single-house seizures from a serving Indian police officer in recent memory. The April 27, 2026 ED operation under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act covered Sector 40 in Chandigarh, five premises in Ludhiana, two in Patiala, plus Nabha and Jalandhar — looking for benami properties and middleman trails, which is what investigators expect to find when an officer earning Rs 45.95 lakh a year somehow accumulates 26 luxury wristwatches and five luxury cars. Bhullar has been out on default bail in the disproportionate assets case — the kind of bail granted automatically when the agency that found Rs 7.36 crore in his house fails to file a chargesheet against him on time. The middleman, Krishanu Sharda, is also out on bail. The Punjab Vigilance Bureau's own FIR describes a 30-year trail of illegal asset accumulation, which is to say the system that was meant to catch a corrupt DIG was outpaced by the DIG for an entire police career.