The Thane police on Tuesday issued notices to directors of Avon life Science and also launched a manhunt for three absconding suspects, including the mastermind, in connection with the seizure of 18.62 tonnes of Ephedrine, a medicine used to manufacture a party drug crystal meth – worth `2,000 crore made from the company’s Solapur factory last week.
With the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) of the Gujarat police having arrested one of the four suspects in connection with a major drug haul, the investigators began to look for the mastermind Punit – whom the medicine manufacturing company had roped in to run the drug manufacturing and trafficking racket – and two other absconding suspects in the case identified Kishore Rathod and Jai Mukhi.
“We have issued notices to the directors of the company to appear before the investigators for questioning in connection with the seizure of drugs last week,” Thane Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh said.
A day after a team of Thane police rushed to Ahmedabad to take into custody one of the key suspects –Narendra Kacha – who has been arrested by the Gujarat ATS, Singh said that Punit had specifically been hired by Avon life Science to run the drug manufacture and trafficking racket.
Talking to media persons at Thane, Singh said that Punit was the brain behind the entire manufacturing and trafficking racket. “We have definite information that Punit had specifically been appointed by the company management to run the racket. Punit was being assisted by Rathod and Mukhi... The modus operandi was that they would transport Ephedrine manufactured at Avon life Science’s Solapur to Ahmedabad, where they would process the same and turn it into party and smuggle it out of the country,” the Thane CP said.
According to Singh, the trio had links with the drug cartels operating aboard, especially Nigeria and other African countries. “Records show that three key suspects, including Punit, have made at least 30 trips during the past one year,” he said.
The Thane police chief said that the investigators were looking for Punit and two other suspects all over the country.