A special NDPS Court at Kujang in Jagatsinghpur district has sought a guarantee of Rs 110 crore for release of cargo ship MV Debi docked at the Paradip Port from which cocaine worth Rs 220 crore was seized in November 2030.
The guarantee includes a Rs 100-crore indemnity bond and a Rs 10-crore bank guarantee.
The owners of the ship have been ordered to appear before the court whenever summoned. The owners can neither sell nor change the colour and modify the vessel in any manner without the court’s order.
The order was passed while hearing a petition by the ship’s owners to release the vessel from the custody of the Indian Customs Department.
The Customs Department had seized 22 packets of cocaine worth a market value of Rs 220 crore from the ship on November 30, 2023. A case was registered under the NDPS Act, 1985 and a probe was launched.
The ship had arrived at Paradip from Indonesia’s Gresik port and was scheduled to depart for Denmark carrying steel plates from Odisha.
However, a crane operator first noticed some suspicious packets in the ship and informed the authorities who came with a dog squad and seized the packets which turned out to be cocaine.
Notably, though the contraband was seized two and a half months ago, the source, destination and the drug mafias involved in it are yet to be revealed.