Drug smugglers using new ways to evade arrest: Punjab Police

Inspector General of Police IGP Sukhchain Singh Gill said with police tightening the noose around drug smuggling, drug suppliers are now adopting new ways to evade arrests by selling drugs in milligrams and grams so that it could not be detected.One latest trend has come to fore wherein drug smugglers smuggled drugs by concealing them in onion-laden trucks to avoid the stench, said Gill here.

Drug smugglers have now started peddling narcotics using new ways to avoid detection and evade arrest, Punjab police said on Tuesday. Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sukhchain Singh Gill said with police tightening the noose around drug smuggling, drug suppliers are now adopting new ways to evade arrests by selling drugs in milligrams and grams so that it could not be detected.

''One latest trend has come to fore wherein drug smugglers smuggled drugs by concealing them in onion-laden trucks to avoid the stench,'' said Gill here. Recently, it has also been observed that supply from Abohar and Ferozepur sides is increasing and drug suppliers are now preferring public transport to smuggle drugs, to avoid checking, the IGP said. Intoxicant tablets are majorly being supplied from Uttar Pradesh-Delhi side from areas of Saharanpur, Ghaziabad, and Bahadurgarh via Haryana, while opium and poppy husk are mostly coming from Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan side. Earlier, drug suppliers were even found to be selling small quantities of narcotics 'on foot' and concealing the drugs in ponds and fields to avoid recovery during raids. Gill said the Punjab Police have also waged war against anti-social elements and gangsters 327 drug smugglers were arrested after registering 230 first information reports (FIRs), including 31 commercial, under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act across the state in the last one week, he said.

43 proclaimed offenders have also been arrested in drug cases last week. During the arrest, 11.73 kg heroin, 20 kg opium, 9 kg ganja, 5.76 quintals of poppy husk, and 28,000 tablets, capsules, injections and vials of Pharma opioids along with Rs 20.07 lakh in cash were recovered by the police, he added.