Amphetamine worth Rs 9 crore seized from IAF man's Secunderabad house

Hyderabad: The Narcotics Control Bureau, Bengaluru zone, which is investigating a drug racket that allegedly involves an IAF wing commander, Bengaluru-based scientist and his wife, seized amphetamine drug worth Rs 9 crore from a house in Secunderabad that had been taken on rent by the IAF officer.

NCB officials arrested the Bengaluru-based scientist, Venkat Ramarao, in Hyderabad and his wife Preethi in Bengaluru for allegedly manufacturing the drug. The police had seized 231 kg of drug worth Rs 45 crore from them.

Soon after, Rajashekar Reddy, the IAF wing commander, too was arrested for heading the racket.  “We busted a clandestine drugs manufacturing and processing lab in Vidyapura, Saineekpuri of Secunderabad and seized 9.1 kg of amphetamine. The lab was being run in a house that was taken on rent by Rajashekar Reddy. We suspect that the lab was being used to further process, manufacture and test the contraband drug,” NCB officials said. The entire lab along with its apparatus was dismantled by the NCB Hyderabad team in a day-long operation in the posh defence locality on October 26. The materials recovered were produced before the sessions court at L.B. Nagar, Hyderabad on Thursday.

The value of the seized drug is around Rs 2.5 crore in the Indian market and around '9 crore in the international market.

The NCB is still investigating to find out whether any others were involved in the racket and if the accused had any other labs/processing facilities for the manufacturing of the contraband in any other parts of the country.

4 held, cocaine seized

The HAL police have arrested a gang of four, including a woman, who were selling contraband drugs to their clients in the city. The police recovered 335 gm of cocaine, worth Rs 10 lakh, from them. The drug was packaged in more than 600 small packets, each containing 5 to 10 milligrams.

The accused have been identified as Murshid, 32, Bablu Sheikh, 35, Mubarak Saha, 40 and Muneera Sheikh, 35.

The accused hail from West Bengal and used to purchase drugs from one of their contacts in Kolkata, the police said.

Based on a tip-off HAL Police Inspector Sadiq Pasha and his team zeroed in on the gang and caught them red-handed.