NAGERCOIL: A year after assuming office, Superintendent of Police (SP) V Badri Narayanan is devoted to his plan to rescue the youth in the district from the tentacles of ganja addiction. In the last 15 months, police have arrested more than 370 ganja sellers and peddlers and seized 750 kilogramme of it.
A member of one of the special teams to zero down on ganja smugglers said the contraband was mainly smuggled into Kanniyakumari district from Theni, Madurai and Dindigul on two-wheelers and cars. Cops say they have even seized parcels of marijuana from Andhra Pradesh.
Commenting on how the ganja trade was by the youth and for the youth, a sub-inspector said, “Not only college students but also youth who have jobs use ganja,” he said. As far as the geography of the trade is concerned, most of the arrested people were from the Kanniyakumari district and the Kerala border.
The 32-year-old SP said eight special teams were formed in four police subdivisions to monitor the weed route. “Two teams of four police personnel each headed by a sub-inspector have been formed for each police sub-division. The contraband was smuggled into the district by road ‘trips’. The social media boom has been a boon for weed peddlers. The sellers and buyers use WhatsApp for encrypted communication,” he said.
Narayanan said just arresting the sellers and peddlers was not enough. “Most of the drug users are below the age of 30. We are working towards breaking the chain of users, peddlers, suppliers and wholesale suppliers,” he said.
But what about people who want to beat their addiction for a better life? SP Narayanan told TNIE they had introduced Whatsapp number(7010363173) for people recovering from drug addiction. But no youth has come forward so far. In an effort to make youngsters take the high road of an addiction-free life, police have started raising awareness of the ill effects of ganja. In line with this initiative, a short film ‘Pothai Vendamae Nanbaa’ was released on drug awareness.
Principal of John's Central School, Anjugramam, J Sherene said she was glad the police personnel were conducting awareness programmes in schools to inform kids about the vices of ganja.
Meanwhile, a resident said one of his relatives had stopped using ganja and started going to work. " I salute the cops for taking action against ganja sellers."
Another resident said the sale of Ganja was under control as the cops were tracking the phones of ganja users.
Associate Professor and Head, Department of Sociology, St Hindu College, Nagercoil, S Surendran said the initiative to put an end to ganja should be a ‘joint’ effort of the police department and educational institutions. “The educational institutions should form a committee to identify and reach out to youth affected by ganja. Students know their peers well. So by interacting with them, addicts could be given physiological and medical support to come out of the addiction,” he said.