KOCHI: In the wake of the Supreme Court recently coming down heavily on the police over pilferage of seized narcotics from custody in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) cases, state police chief Loknath Behera has come out with strict directives, which point out that the difference in quantity of the contraband seized with that of the quantity recorded in seizure memo was one of the main reasons for poor conviction rate in NDPS cases.
“Contraband in a huge quantity is stated to be seized and sealed on the spot by the I.O. However, during the course of trial, the seizure is proved to be of lesser quantity and not in consonance with the seizure memo,” he said in the circular, which also made it mandatory for the police to ensure the informant/ complainant and the probe officer cannot be the same.
The top court had pulled up the police saying illicit drugs seized every year could be re-entering the market, “surreptitiously sold by lower-level staff in agencies”. “As the states and the Centre did not have any clear-cut policy for storage and disposal of seized drugs like hashish and ganja, there were loopholes and people within Narcotic Control Bureau or the police were re-routing them to make profit.”
However, a senior cop said there were only a few incidents in Kerala where there was a difference between seized quantity and that recorded in seizure memo.