BHOPAL: An inter-state drug smuggler’s quest for the removal of ‘planetary bad effects’ from his birth horoscope landed him in Rajasthan police net at a temple in Madhya Pradesh’s Ujjain. On the run in a case of drug smuggling registered against him in Jodhpur district in 2023, 37-year-old opium and poppy husk smuggler Rakesh Jat, operating from MP’s Neemuch district, was arrested by a team of Rajasthan’s anti-narcotics task force (ANTF) dressed as pilgrims.
“Our team of five policemen posed as pilgrims after coming to know that Rakesh was present in Ujjain to offer special puja for removal of ‘kal sarp dosh’ from his horoscope. The team went offering prayers from one temple in Ujjain to another, including the famous Mahakal Temple, to look for Rakesh. After visits to 15 temples in two days, the team managed to spot Rakesh at a temple where he was offering the special prayers and rituals,” Rajasthan ANTF inspector general Vikas Kumar said.
ANTF had been conducting raids at locations across MP in search of Rakesh for four months, but the ITI diploma holder, who was running a opium and poppy straw smuggling racket in Marwar region of Rajasthan, continued to escape.
Recently, ANTF got a tip-off that Rakesh had met an astrologer to evade Rajasthan police. The astrologer told him that he was in trouble owing to the ‘kal sarp dosh’ in his birth horoscope. The astrologer advised Rakesh that the ‘dosh’ would be removed only after he performs special rituals in Ujjain, preferably at the Mahakal temple. “Coming to know about it, our team dressed as pilgrims started camping in Ujjain. After searching temples across the religious city for two days, the team finally nabbed Rakesh at one of the lesser-known temples,” Kumar added.
“Rakesh’s arrest has helped us bust the opium and poppy husk smuggling racket in Marwar region. He sourced poppy husk and opium from illegal cultivators in MP and supplied it to most of the drug smugglers in southwestern and western parts of Rajasthan. His arrest would help us in making further inroads into the inter-state drugs rackets operating between MP and Rajasthan,” the Rajasthan IG said.
While farming on his father’s land in Neemuch, Rakesh got in touch with a poppy contractor 10 years ago and subsequently got connected with drug smugglers of adjoining Rajasthan. A few years later, he was arrested by MP police and jailed for 18 months for trafficking drugs to Rajasthan. In the jail, he met notorious drug smugglers of Marwar and later became their key supplier.
