Vigilant law enforcing agencies are cracking down hard on the drug cartels operating across the country and drug seizures have become commonplace.
In the past five years, there has been an increase in the seizure of drugs in the country. Huge quantities are being seized by the law enforcement agencies, including the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), Indian Coast Guard, anti-terrorist squads (ATS) and the Police.
A recent report by DRI revealed that there were record seizures of high value drugs, such as cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin, by the agency in the last fiscal year.
Signaling a disturbing trend, the figures revealed that the seizure of highly addictive party drug cocaine has shot up 36-fold to 310 kgs in 2021-22 from the 8.7 kgs in 2020-21 and a mere 1.1 kg in 2019-20. Another high value party drug methamphetamine has seen a 14-fold increase in seizures by the DRI. In 2021-22, an estimated 884.69 kgs was seized in comparison to the 64.39 kgs in 2020-21. Besides this, 3,410.71 kgs of heroin was seized in 2021-22, up 17 times from the previous fiscal. In 2020-21, heroin amounting to 202 kgs and 143 kgs in 2019-20 was seized by the DRI across the country.
Two key trends have emerged in the drug trafficking in recent times, according to the DRI report. Heroin is being trafficked through known trade routes and the innovative methods are being used to conceal the contraband to evade detection during the examination of containers. In a sum up of this year pertaining to the seizure of narcotic drugs, the Anti-Narcotics Cell of the Mumbai Police has registered 708 offences of narcotic substances, arrested 844 people, and seized about four tonnes of narcotic drugs worth Rs 5,000 crore in the international market.
Since the Covid-19 pandemic began, this year has marked the highest number of arrests and seizures by the nodal agency in comparison to the last three years. In 2018, the agency had registered 193 cases, arrested 269 persons, and seized drugs worth Rs 1,021 crore in the market. In 2019, 514 cases were registered, 595 persons arrested, and drugs worth Rs 67 crore were seized.
Throughout this year, the law enforcing agencies have seized drugs from different parts of the country. However, Gujarat has emerged as a state where the maximum quantity of drugs have been seized with increasing frequency since 2021.
According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime’s World Drug Report 2022, released in June, India has emerged as one of the world’s single largest opiate markets in terms of users. The Indian market would likely be vulnerable to an increased supply, as there are already signs that an intensification of trafficking in opiates originating in Afghanistan may be taking place eastwards, said the report. While Punjab and Himachal Pradesh are leading in India’s epidemic of opioid users, Gujarat is now the third-worst state in terms of deaths due to drug overdose.
In February this year, a joint operation conducted by NCB and the Indian Navy led to the seizure of 750 kgs of drugs valued at Rs 2,000 crore from a ship off the Gujarat coast. In April, in a joint operation by the Anti-Terrorist Squad and the DRI, 260 kgs of heroin was seized at the Kandla Port in Gujarat. On July 12, in a joint operation the Punjab Police and the Gujarat ATS seized 75 kg of high-quality heroin from a container at the Mundra Port in Kutch district. Billed as carrying textiles, the container which originated from Dubai was only filled to one-third its capacity and was kept near a container freight station of the Mundra Port complex. The largest consignment of drugs in the country was also seized from the Mundra Port in September 2021. The size of the contraband shipped from the Bandar Abbas port in Iran to Mundra shocked the law enforcement agencies. Nearly 3 metric tonnes of heroin or 2,988.21 kg worth more than Rs 21,000 crore in the international market were seized from the containers in 2021.
According to ATS sources, the porous Gujarat coastline has become an easy smuggling route for drug cartels from other countries. Small manufacturing units processing heroin are mushrooming across Gujarat, said the source.
In August this year, in an operation led by the Mumbai Police, 513 kgs of mephedrone worth Rs 1,026 crore was seized from a manufacturing unit in Ankleshwar in Gujarat. On September 14, along the coast of Gujarat, in Indian waters the ATS and the Indian Coast Guard apprehended a fishing boat carrying 40 kilograms of heroin worth Rs 200 crore in the international market. The crew consisted of six Pakistani nationals. In another seizure in early October this year, once again the Gujarat ATS and the Indian Coast Guard caught a Pakistani boat and recovered 50 kg heroin worth Rs 350 crore in the international market. Yet again six Pakistani nationals were arrested in this operation.
Even without including the narcotics smuggled from other borders of the country, the extensive Gujarat coastline along the Arabian Sea has become a preferred route of drug traffickers, said sources in the know. In 2022, the law enforcement agencies seized over 1,300 kg of heroin worth Rs 6,800 crore in various operations carried out in Gujarat, Delhi and Kolkata.
In March 2021, the Indian Coast Guard seized a boat in the Arabian Sea which was carrying a cache of 301 kgs of heroin, five AK-47s and 1,000 rounds of ammunition. In April 2021, the Gujarat ATS arrested eight Pakistani nationals on board a fishing boat, off Jakhau in the Indian waters, with heroin worth Rs 150 crore.
Following the drug seizures in 2021, the Union government had entrusted the preliminary investigation of the seizures to the National Investigating Agency (NIA). It revealed that the international drug syndicate involved in the smuggling was based out of Pakistan. In 2022, the Gujarat ATS has seized 717.3 kgs of drugs valued totally at Rs 3,586 crore. So far 16 Pakistanis and three Afghan nationals have been arrested.