BENGALURU: With drug peddling getting tougher with each passing day, smugglers are now colluding with courier agencies, paying at least Rs 1 lakh to ship drugs, bypassing all security checks at airports, especially in Bengaluru and Mangaluru.
To cover their tracks, the kingpins send different “human couriers” with drugs, ensuring that no one suspects them. This plan, a Central Crime Branch (CCB) official said, is effective because airport security checks are based on prior intelligence, and courier services ensure that packaging of drugs is done in such a way that avoids detection.
Sleuths from CCB’s anti-narcotics wings of Bengaluru and Mangaluru told TNIE that these traffickers, like cyber fraudsters, have established a well-organised hierarchy.
Drugs sourced from densely populated cities: CCB
Drugs, mostly produced in Delhi, are smuggled to other cities through these courier channels to ensure smooth passage at airports.
According to police, this ‘anonymous’ pattern came to light recently after Mangaluru’s CCB busted the largest-ever drugs racket in the state, leading to the arrest of two South African women and seizure of 37.878 kg of MDMA valued at Rs 75 crore.
A senior CCB official said, “Drugs are sourced from cities that are densely populated and geographically unfamiliar to local investigators, making it difficult to trace their origin. Such cities are far away and are unknown to the teams investigating the end points, making tracking the supply chain challenging,” the official said. Drugs are smuggled through various layers, involving couriers, sub-peddlers, and peddlers — none of whom know each other, he added.
Each layer is found handling certain quantities of drugs. “The first layer only carries a few grams, while the fourth layer possesses several kg of drugs,” the officer said.
While drugs are sent to cities such as Mangaluru or border areas like Kasaragod in Kerala, sub-peddlers only handle small quantities, just a few grams, for distribution in their areas. Large quantities of drugs are sent to bigger cities such as Bengaluru, Goa and Chennai, which further complicates the investigation and breaks the chain, according to police sources.
Each time they seized a drug shipment, they uncovered a trail of digital footprints such as phone calls, social media messages and bank transactions. However, phone numbers are registered under fake identities and transactions are done through mule accounts,” a senior officer said.
Moreover, all communications are sent in “disappearing mode” with conversations vanishing after a short time. For instance, names used for contacts in one case were aliases like “I Love God,” “Mogambo,” and “Apple Pie”— leaving investigators baffled, the officer said.
“The real challenge is thousands of foreign nationals are involved, operating under Indian names,” an officer said, adding that these false identities and encrypted communication make it impossible for investigators to pin down those behind the operations. After the pattern came to light, the police said they are working closely with airports, airlines, and check-in services to identify and intercept the network at various stages of supply.