BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh is likely to shift from seizure-based anti-narcotics operations to network-based action aimed at dismantling the entire infrastructure supporting drug trafficking, following Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s deadline to make the state drug-free by December 31, 2029.
A few hours after Shah announced the three-year deadline at Bhopal’s BHEL Dussehra Ground on Saturday, a high-level meeting chaired by the state Chief Minister was held to discuss a strategy to achieve the target. The meeting was attended, among others, by Union Home Secretary Naveen Mohan, Special Secretary (Internal Security) Anand Swaroop and Director General of the Narcotics Control Bureau (DG-NCB) Anurag Garg.
The meeting focused particularly on the narcotics menace and the Centre-Madhya Pradesh strategy to meet the 2029 deadline.
Although Shah skipped the meeting for unspecified reasons, the press conference on the narcotics issue was subsequently cancelled. The high-level Centre-state meeting, which discussed multiple Home Department issues, gave particular focus to tackling the narcotics drug menace.
According to sources privy to the meeting, the discussions especially focused on strategic shift from seizure-based operations to network-based operations.
Importantly, a network-based strategy shifts the focus of drug enforcement from merely confiscating physical substances (seizure-based strategy) to dismantling the entire criminal infrastructure behind the illicit trade. While a seizure-based approach targets the symptoms by intercepting illicit transport, a network-based strategy targets the root cause by mapping, disrupting, and dismantling the organizational, financial, and logistical networks of drug trafficking organizations (DTOs).
The meeting identified the inter-state smuggling of Ganja from Odisha via Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh and smuggling of opium, poppy husk/straw from the western MP districts to adjoining states as major issues to be particularly dealt with.
The union home secretary emphasised on the need for joint intelligence-sharing and coordinated action with neighbouring states, particularly in view of Madhya Pradesh’s borders with Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Chhattisgarh, not just to tackle the inter-state drug corridors, but also the movement of criminals and arms-smuggling.
He emphasised the more effective use of NATGRID, implementation of a ‘Drug-Free Campus’ framework in all higher educational institutions, early establishment of NDPS Special Courts, and formation of an Anti-Narcotics Task Force in the state.
The meeting was informed that strict and continuous action is being taken to strengthen law and order. The police department has busted 17 clandestine laboratories involved in manufacturing drugs. Action against habitual drug offenders under the PIT-NDPS Act has been intensified.
According to informed sources, the departure from seizure-based operations to network based operations which focusses on dismantling the entire narcotics network till the source and dedicated tracing and action against the forward and backward linkages of the multiple drug networks, particularly assumes significance as the drugs menace is no longer confined just to poppy husk/opium, Ganja and cough syrup smuggling.
Multiple arrests of Nigerian and Indian nationals in MP over the last few weeks by the directorate of revenue intelligence (DRI) from onboard trains and buses destined to southern and western India, have placed the central Indian state as a major point on the route of inter-state synthetic drugs smuggling syndicated originating particularly from northern India.
Besides, multiple synthetic drugs units have been busted by investigation agencies in Bhopal and parts of western MP over the last few months, exposing how synthetic drugs are not just being routed via MP, but also being illegally made in the state for supply elsewhere, up to western and southern India.
Over the last few weeks operations by investigative agencies have also led to a new trend, the Nigerian drug traffickers slowly shifting from air-conditioned coaches of long distance trains to second class sleeper coaches of the same trains, like the Mumbai-bound Punjab Mail.
