Odisha signs MoU with IIT-Madras for enhancing road safety mechanism
This significant initiative was formalized through the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in the presence of Bibhuti Bhushan Jena, Minister of Commerce and Transport.
In a joint anti-drug operation, the Special Task Force (STF) of Odisha police and its West Bengal counterparts have made a seizure of over Rs one crore worth of brown sugar from an interstate drug peddler in the neighbouring State.
The banned brown sugar weighing 1.043 kg and valued at over Rs one crore was seized from the possession of accused person Safikul Seikh at Mirzapur under Beldanga police station in Murshidabad district of West Bengal.
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During interrogation, accused Safikul confessed that he procured the brown sugar from a wanted drug peddler Sk. Lalu accused. Lalu was one of the masterminds of the inter-state drug trafficking gang and was on the run.
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“He was produced before the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Tehatta in Nadia which granted the STF a transit remand of 5 days. He will be produced in the District and Sessions Judge’s court in Cuttack. Further investigation is on”, STF said in a statement.
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 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.
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