In a fight against menace of drug abuse, the Chief Ministers of four northern states—Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Uttrakhand—on Monday decided to unanimously set up a common central secretariat in Panchkula for sharing data and information, which is vital for the joint action.
The decision was taken during the Regional Conference on Drugs – Challenges & Strategies, convened here to discuss and formulate a joint strategy to fight drugs.
The conference was attended by Haryana Chief Minister Manohar lal, Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, Uttarakhand CM TS Rawat, with Himachal Pradesh CM Jai Ram Thakur participating through video conference as he was unable to land due to bad weather.
Senior civil and police officers from these states, as well as Rajasthan, Delhi and Chandigarh, were also present at the meeting, aimed at evolving a joint strategy against drugs, overcoming all political and regional divides.
In a first, the majority of northern states during the meeting decided to join hands and set up a common secretariat to effectively address and counter the menace of narcotics in north India.
The Chief Ministers will now meet every six months to monitor the progress of the joint strategy against drugs, while officers will meet every three months. The conference also envisaged inviting the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and representative of Jammu and Kashmir to evolve the anti-drug strategy.
On the suggestion of Capt Amarinder Singh, it was further decided to hold a meeting once every quarter at the highest official level, rotationally chaired by the Chief Secretary or the Director General Police of the states concerned.
The Senior Superintendents of Police of the adjoining districts of various states would also coordinate on a day-to-day level, the meeting decided.
It was also decided that the states would launch a major awareness campaign in their respective schools, while engaging youth in sports and other activities at village levels.
Skill development of youth would also be undertaken on a major scale to prevent the spread of drugs.
All the states were of the view that information and data sharing was critical to making the fight against drugs a success.
During the meeting, Punjab CM mooted a slew of ideas, including evolution of a “Regional Cooperative Framework” of the northern states to institutionalise the inter-state and inter-agency coordination to deal with the menace.
Haryana CM Manohar lal emphasised upon having fast- track courts to decide drug cases while Himachal Pradesh CM suggested that the Prevention of Anti-Social Activities Act should be invoked against drug peddlers, with a special board being formed in case of arrest for more than three months.
Uttrakhand Chief Minister expressed concern over the women too increasingly taking to drugs.
The Chief Ministers later, while addressing the mediapersons said that they have decided to invite Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh and senior officers of Jammu and Kashmir as well to join the anti-drug strategy implementation.
“Drugs have no boundaries, therefore the need for a joint strategy,” Capt Amarinder said
“We shared our experiences so far in our state-specific battles against drugs and recognized our common concern for developing strategies and actions that our governments can take to protect our youth, children and the next generations from the harm of drugs,” the Ministers said in the statement.
On the enforcement front, the Ministers agreed to be more proactive and facilitate a quick exchange of information on drug trends, cases registered, persons named, wanted or arrested, the statement said.
All the measures will be effective from Monday, the statement added.
To prevent young children from falling prey to drug addiction, they decided to launch awareness programmes by departments – including the Education, Health, Skill Development – along with non-government and community organisations in schools, colleges, universities and residential areas.
The conference also highlighted the importance of using social media to spread awareness about drug abuse. It was agreed upon investing more resources in setting up more de-addiction centres and strengthening the existing ones whether in the public or private sector.
“We agreed to go in for intensive identification of “at high risk” individuals and addicts and their prompt medical treatment. We also agreed to strengthen the work at the grassroots through use of all possible technologies to make more and more of our villages, mohallas and cities drugs free,” the Chief Ministers said in the joint statement.
Before the start of the conference, a two-minute silence was observed to pay homage to the former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.