Two arrested
In its war against drug menace, Punjab Police has made another breakthrough in cracking the transit lines of second top drug cartel with a seizure of 12 kilograms heroin in transit from Pakistan to New Delhi with the arrest of two top smugglers.
The seizure comes close on the heels of neutralisation of a major international drug cartel with seizure of 27 kg heroin in transit from Pakistan to Rajasthan (via Jammu and Kashmir) on June 27.
“Punjab Police has successfully concluded a week-long intelligence-based operation to break the transit lines of the second top drug cartel emanating from Pakistan on July 5 with seizure of 12 kg heroin in transit from Pakistan to New Delhi (via J&K), two Chinese-made .30 bore pistols and arrest of two top smugglers, including the Delhi-based “end-recipient” Raman Pandit from New Delhi,” said the State Inspector General of Police, Border, Amritsar, Ishwar Chander.
The accused were identified as Raman Pandit resident of Pritampura, New Delhi, and Bhajan Singh, a resident of Kakkar Kalan village in Amritsar district. While Pandit was arrested from New Delhi, Bhajan was arrested from Punjab.
As per the figures provided by the state police of heroin seizures of preceding three years, a manifold increase has been witnessed in the quantity of heroin seizures from top smugglers. The figures has gone up from 100.924 kg in 2011, to 350 kg till the month of July this year.
“This heroin originated from Pakistan, was mostly in transit to “end-recipients” outside the state where after dilution or adulteration, the heroin is thrown in the distribution network in various states of the country, including Punjab, and, smuggled to the international market,” said Chander.
The Punjab police has also made relevant seizures of preceding three years to break supply lines of local consumption. As per the figures, up to June 30, 12.359 kgs smack, 49.175 kgs charas, 334.491 kgs opium, 632.718 kgs bhang, and 66020.054 kgs poppy husk. The figures stood at 48.913 kgs smack, 173.141 kgs charas, 963.815 kgs opium, 529.028 kgs bhang, 236639.240 kgs poppy husk. Till June 30 this year, a total of 612.280 kgs intoxicant powder, 7253 injections, and 1718721 pills or capsules were seized.
“local consumption of pure heroin in the state was minimal. There is manifold increase in seizure of smack, which is meant for local consumption in the state. The consumption of pharmaceutical origin intoxicants is a major problem in the State,” said Chander, adding that during the drive to break the supply line, effective steps have been taken to plug ‘unauthorized’ consumption.
To take action against smugglers of opium, poppy-husk, charas etc who used to send such narcotics to the state, Punjab Police parties have gone to other states like Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, UP, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh to arrest top smugglers and effect seizures.
“In recent drive against drug trafficking in the state, a large number of persons in the supply line have been arrested. A large number of persons had to be proceeded against since even small quantities of hard drugs like heroin or smack used to change several hands before reaching the end consumers through the street peddlers. This exercise has been carried out under the personal supervision of the district SSPs and is limited to the supply line terminating at peddler level,” he added.
Due to breaking of supply lines and distribution system in the state, there is no availability of drugs to the former consumers, claimed the IG.
“As a result, former consumers are flocking to de-addiction centres in large numbers. In the last fortnight, over 80,000 former consumers have been treated as OPD patients and over 1,200 as indoor patients in the state hospitals, community health centres and de-addiction centres,” said Chander.
Out of these, over 10,000 have been brought or referred to the hospital or de-addiction center by the police personnel. Each and every village has been covered by the SHO or concerned gazetted officer (GO) for this purpose. The police support to former consumers is being supervised by the concerned Zonal IGPs.