Jalandhar, November 29: With the state’s borders under the increased vigil of the Punjab Police and the Border Security Force (BSF) to ensure drug smuggling does not happen from there, Delhi has emerged as new source of supply for the state’s smugglers, the Jalandhar Police have found.
“In the last 100 substantial recoveries of heroin and other contraband in the district, over 80% are linked to Delhi. We have arrested 485 peddlers over the past four months,” said Jalandhar SSP Navjot Singh Mahal. He added, “Opium and drug tablets are being smuggled in huge quantity from Delhi. Poppy husk is being smuggled from Jammu and Kashmir, while opium comes from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.”
Over the past four months, the Jalandhar Rural Police have seized 23kg opium, 8.5-kg heroin, 1,385-kg poppy husk, over 2 lakh drug tablets and other banned substances from 485 drug peddlers.
“Smugglers are shifting base to Delhi, from Pakistan and Afghanistan due to increased checking. The drug mafia now considers Delhi as a transit hub and areas in the city like outer Delhi and west Delhi are emerging as centres that supply such contraband,” said a senior police officer, not wishing to be named.
Police add that this year to date, eight foreigner drug peddlers had been with arrested with 4.3-kg heroin. Six of these arrests and seizure of 3.3kg heroin had been made over the past months, indicating a spurt in smuggling activity, a department official claimed, adding that all of them had sourced the drug from Delhi.
SSP Mahal added, “Local drug peddlers confessed to have bought these drugs, especially heroin fromDelhi, to sell in Jalandhar at profit. They prefer to use public road transport.” He added that in the two recent arrests of a Nigerian with 1.5kg on November 19 and the arrest of two men with 255gm heroin on Monday (November 26), the source of the contraband found on them was Delhi.
Source Hindustan Times
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