Bengaluru cops on a drive to sniff out drug peddlers

Bengaluru: The City police have taken up a massive drive against drug peddling and substance abuse and registered 81 cases under the Narcotic Drugs & Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act against 84 local people and 26 foreigners.

During the raids the police seized 81 kgs of ganja, three kg of charas, 500 gms of brown sugar, cocaine, MDMA and Yaba, a new entrant, smuggled in the country via Bangladesh from the notorious ‘Golden Triangle’ comprising Myanamar, Thailand and Laos. Yaba is a deadly blend of ‘methamphetamine’ and caffeine. The NDPS cases have seen an increase in the last few years. In 2016 the City police registered 128 cases and 60 cases were registered in 2015. According to City police records 667 cases have been registered against foreigners between 2010 and 2017. “Out of these 302 were convicted, 251 are pending trial, 71 are under investigation and 24 were acquitted, 49 foreigners are in judicial custody and 229 are on bail,” state the crime records.

 The officer added that the foreigners, who have been enlarged on bail, cannot be deported because as per their bail condition they cannot leave the country. “We cannot deport them even though they have committed a crime and may also be living here without valid passports. Once out on bail they disappear and are difficult to track,” said a senior police officer on condition of anonymity.

Meanwhile, the police with the help of the Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) have taken up a drive to deport foreigners, who are over staying in Bengaluru in violation of their visa.

 Police Commissioner Praveen Sood said they have written to educational institutions, which have a sizeable population of foreign students to inform the police about students, who indulge in criminal and anti-social activities.

Cocaine seized from Nigerian
The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), Hyderabad unit, has arrested a Nigerian national on charges of drug trafficking on Thursday and seized cocaine worth Rs 1 crore from his possession. The NCB sleuths intercepted Lary Onyekachi (35), when he was travelling to Bengaluru in Bangalore Rajdhani Express. Based on intelligence inputs, the NCB sleuths intercepted him at Secunderabad Railway Station