Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal met Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment Thaawar Chand Gehlot on Monday seeking his intervention in curbing the menace of drug abuse in teenagers, which is gripping the young in the State like wild fire.
“The Chief Minister requested the Minister to help establish drug de-addiction centres across the States, besides setting up more health centres,” said an official from the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (MSJE).
“The Chief Minister also requested the Minister for increasing scholarship schemes for students from the Scheduled Castes and backward classes. He said that the youth from poor backgrounds needed financial help and direction in life to help them stay away from addictions,” the official maintained.
The trend in the last two decades shows that the pattern of drug use has undergone a change in favour of new narcotic and synthetic drugs, with addicts now consuming multiple drugs.
Although there has been no comprehensive study to ascertain the number of drug addicts in the State, a couple of surveys conducted by the State Health Department estimate that between 50 per cent to 60 per cent of young people between the ages of 16 and 35 are addicted to drugs.
A recent study by Dr Ravinder Sandhu of Guru Nanak Dev University shows that the incidence of such crimes in Punjab is nine times the national average. Between 1999 and 2008 (the years when Punjab was recovering from the aftermath of terrorism), such crimes registered a staggering 245 per cent increase. Punjab became the State with the highest number of narcotics-related crimes, surpassing Mizoram which earlier held this dubious distinction.
Sandhu, who studied a sample of 600 addicts, found that the majority were from 16-35 years of age, which was 73.5 per cent.
Researchers say that the problem is acute in the State as Punjab is situated between two major illicit opium producing centers in Asia - the Golden Crescent and Golden Triangle. Hence, the State functions as a transshipment point for heroin destined for Europe.
Over the recent years, the State has turned into a hub for illicit drugs like raw opium, smack, heroin, synthetic drugs like morphine, pethidine, codeine and psychotropic substances like diazepam. Drugs being pushed through by Pakistan is only worsening the scenario.
Annually, the drug trade is estimated to have increased by about 30- 40 per cent. Punjab alone accounts for 60 per cent of the country’s overall drug recoveries.
“Three years’ imprisonment and a fine of Rs 100,000 for violation of the Drugs & Cosmetics Act of 1940 have proved inadequate to curb the lure of immense black market profits from sale of these illicit substances,” said the official.
“Profits from drug trades only aid the mushrooming of dozens of illegal chemist laboratories in almost all villages across districts in Punjab,” said the official.