In the latest interception of narcotic substances, the Special Task Force (STF) wing of the crime branch on Friday made a seizure of brown sugar valued at more than Rs one crore in the black market and arrested the suspected drug peddler.
The drug peddler possessing 1.048 kilograms of brown sugar was nabbed near Pipili-Nimapara over-bridge in Puri district.
The accused failed to furnish any valid authority in support of the possession of such contraband materials and was arrested under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substance (NDPS) act, 1985. He was later remanded to judicial custody, said STF sleuths.
The STF is continuing its well-orchestrated operation on drug peddlers across the State. And the ongoing crackdown on drug peddling is paying rich dividends. In the past 19 months, the STF has seized 35 kilograms of brown sugar. The seized narcotics would have fetched the drug peddlers nearly Rs 35 crore in the international market, said Deputy Inspector General of Police, STF, Jay Narayan Pankaj.
Besides more than 6752 KGs of cannabis were also seized during the period by STF with over 100 drug peddlers put behind bars.
The increased crackdown on drug peddlers could be gauged from the fact that the cumulative seizure of brown sugar in the past 19 months is more than three-fold that of the drug haul of the past eight years.
The banned substances are making their way to Odisha from Murshidabad in West Bengal. Balasore district bordering Bengal has become the gateway to drug peddling networks in the State. The source point of the brown sugar trade in the State owes its origin to Murshidabad. The organized rackets of drug peddlers based in Balasore have spread their network to major urban centres- Cuttack, Bhubaneswar, Puri, Rourkela, Sambalpur, and Puri- of the State, STF officials concluded.