The Kochi police on Tuesday arrested DJ and film actor Mithun P Vilas, alias Kokkachi Mithun, who was the main organiser of the DJ party held on May 23 at a luxury hotel outside the city from where seven persons, including Russian musician Vasily Markelov, aka Psykovsky, were arrested for possession and use of narcotic substances.
Mithun, arrested from his house near Edappally in Kochi on Tuesday morning, told the police that developing drugs trade was the intention behind organising the DJ party in which more than 200 persons had participated. The police said they seized 36 grams of hashish, ten grams of a ganja concoction and heroin from the loudspeaker chamber of his car.
Mithun is a prominent DJ who used to host parties across Kerala and is also an upcoming actor in the Malayalam film industry. He is said to have vast connections in the film sector. Officials indicated that the probe into the May 23 DJ party could extend to a Kochi-based businessman-film producer and that more arrests could take place in the coming days.
He is the second Malayalam film actor to be arrested in connection with drugs in Kochi this year. In an early morning raid on January 31at a luxury apartment in Kadavanthra in the city, the police had arrested new generation Malayalam film actor Shine Tom Chacko for using cocaine. Four young women had also been arrested along with him.
The police said Mithun was planning large-scale drugs trade through the DJ party but he admitted to the officials that the May 23 party had not brought any financial benefit to him. It was Mithun who had brought Psykovsky, a popular figure in the field of Psychedelic Trans music, to Kochi to act as DJ at last weekend’s party.
Officials said that Mithun had been supplying high-grade narcotic substances to elite abusers of Kochi including those working in the film industry. He admitted that he had sourced the drugs from a film set in Goa. The police are trying to find out whether he has any connections with the international drug mafia which is believed to be trying to spread its roots in the cities of Kerala.
The Kochi police believe that Goa has become a favourite sourcing centre for drugs for the peddlers in Kerala. Reshma Rangaswamy, one of the four young women arrested in connection with the cocaine seizure, had got the drug from a Nigerian national, Okowe Chigozie Collins, who had brought it to Kochi from Goa by train.
Security experts said that Mithun’s arrest would help the Kochi police to regain its credibility which had taken a beating after a Magistrate granted bail to all those arrested from the DJ party of May 23 for want of evidence for drug abuse. However, the police had interpreted the granting of bail as part of a natural legal procedure.
Sources said that the raid at the luxury hotel during the DJ party last weekend and the subsequent arrests were part of the Kochi police’s resumed battle against the drug mafia. The police had carried out a major crackdown on drug peddlers and abusers in the city almost a year ago with raids at late night parties in a luxury hotel and a cruise boat.