AGARTALA:
The Tripura government, on April 25, said that drug menace has drastically come down in the state following intensified crackdown by the police in the region.
Lauding the role of the police in this regard, chief minister Biplab Kumar Deb said, “Under the pledge ‘Nasha Mukta Tripura’, the state has marched forward in tackling the menace. Drug cases recorded since 2017 too have come down drastically.”
A report released by the Tripura police has revealed that drug menace, including cultivation, smuggling, and consumption has decreased in the state leading to more arrests, and imposition of stricter containment measures to tackle the menace.
According to the report, since the Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in 2018, while 72, 56, and 83 cases were registered in 2015, 2016, and 2017, respectively, the years 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 saw registration of 433, 301, 291, 352, respectively. And in 2022, following police’s crackdown, the number dropped to only 84.
It was informed that the number of arrests has also shot up in 2022 compared to in 2017. In 2017, only 65 people were arrested, while in 2018, 660 people were arrested, followed by 592 arrests in 2019, 406 in 2020, 501 in 2021 and today, till February 2022 the number of arrests in only 84, the report said.
Similarly, the report also revealed the different seizures made during 2018 to 2022, showing that under the current government, the police department has intensified its effort in preventing smuggling of drugs.
It was reported that in 2017, only 8,589 kg of ganja were seized, whereas the figure rose to 65,363.55 kgs in 2018.
Likewise, in 2019, 15,117.17 kg of ganja were seized and the number rose to 12724.4692 kg in 2020. Moreover, in 2021, 41,565.46 kg were seized, and till February of 2022, 10,176.235 kg of the contraband was seized by the police.
The report further pointed that after 2017, the police department seized more narcotics tablets due to the increased vigilance of the Anti-Narcotics Task Force (ANTF).
In the year 2017, 10, 749 tablets were sized, but in 2016 and 2017, the department didn’t seize a single tablet. However, after the BJP came to power in 2018, 2,79,819 tablets were seized, Likewise, in 2019, 21,23,163, in 2020 around 5,84,119 tablets, in 2021, 14,19,169 tablets were seized and in 2022, the number dropped to 23,326.
As for heroin, 76.06 gm were seized in 2015, 1367 gm in 2016, 82 gm in 2017, 3096.062 gm in 2018, and 4278.9657 gm were seized in 2019.
In 2020, 2021, and 2022 (till February), 2162.351 gm, 3850.6394 gm, and 1550.17 gm of the psychotropic drug was seized, respectively.
Apart from that, huge quantities of banned cough syrup were also seized, and large areas of ganja plantations were also destroyed, the report said.