SHILLONG:
The Meghalaya police has adopted new strategies to combat the rampant drug menace in the state and have stepped up its efforts to strengthen relationships with the people of the state, who are the main stakeholders in this regard.
“The drug menace is becoming a major area of concern for us and we are stepping up efforts to wage a concerted war against this. We are dedicatedly strengthening our relationship with the people who are the main stakeholders. Only when we work together, we can win this battle and eradicate this menace,” said Director General of Police (DGP), LR Bishnoi, over the phone.
The state police have upscaled itself to tackle this emerging threat and specialised and dedicated anti-narcotics task force (ANTF) units are being stationed at each of the 13 districts of the state and they are equipped with the latest narcotics detection kits, narcotic sniffer dogs amongst other specialised equipment.
In the past five years, the state police have arrested 763 persons in connection to various seizures. In all, 446 cases have been registered, charge-sheeted, and final report completed. Peak period was in 2019 with 110 cases being registered and 189 people arrested.
The police chief said, “We are also strengthening our social media band-with to effectively reach out to the people and collectively thwart the evil efforts of the drug smugglers.”
The DGP was referring to the data collated by the state police’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID), according to which, drugs such as heroin, Yaba tablets, and marijuana are the prevalent contrabands used by the youth while opium and cough syrups too have started gaining consumers. Another key factor in the rise of drug usage in the state is its proximity to the infamous Golden Triangle linking linking Myanmar with the country. Meghalaya is an acknowledged as an active transit state and a major route for drug smugglers.
While Tahan, Falam, Jiribam, Silchar, Khliehriat, Jowai and Shillong are the routes that are used to illegally transport contraband and Agartala, Aizawl, Kohima, Silchar, Khliehriat, Jowai, Shillong and Guwahati route is used to transport mainly marijuana, the data revealed.
According to data, trafficking of heroin has seen a spike in the state since 2017. In 2017, the amount of heroin successfully detected by law enforcement agencies stood at 66.82 gm, in 2022, the amount detected shot up to a whopping 1791.951 gm, and the sum total in the last 5 years is 15,950.582 gm.
Second on the list are psychotropic drugs, amphetamine and lately, methamphetamine tablets such as Yaba, speed, crystal, glass, ice, crank and from 193 seized in 2017, the number increased to 21,597 this year and the total contraband seized in the past five years stands at 8,49,275.
Interestingly, the highest seizure was during the pandemic of 2020 when a total of 3,47,439 were seized. When it comes to cough syrups, as many as 5978 bottles of assorted prescribed cough syrups were seized over the last 5 years with 2019 recording the peak at 2943 bottles. Detection and seizure of Opium has been on the downside as only 2,796.14 gm detected so far, with last year accounting for most at 2010.14 gm.
Marijuana continues to be the main substance used in this part of the region with a whopping 7,709.52212 gm of total seizure in the past five years. Though in 2017, the amount of marijuana detected was only 101.900 gm, this year alone 2188.305 gm has been detected so far.