SRINAGAR: As past few years have witnessed a jump in drug abuse in Jammu and Kashmir causing the utmost concern among the authorities and vast sections of local population alike, the Union Territory’s police have intensified their efforts in the fight against the menace.
The officials say that apart from focussing on eradicating the drug abuse among the youth by running addiction treatment centres, holding counselling sessions regularly and providing support and guidance to individuals struggling with addiction, the police are spearheading a tough campaign against drug trafficking.
In the past few months, dozens of the residential houses and other properties of the alleged drug peddlers valued at billions of rupees have been attached under the provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act 1985, officials said.
Also, the police and other law enforcing agencies have invoked Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (PITNDPS) Act 1988 and the UT’s own stringent Public Safety Act (PSA) to break the supply chair of the narcotic substances, combat other drug-related crimes and deter the kingpins resulting in more than 600 detention orders in past two years, the officials said. They added that the J&K police’s ‘Anti-narcotics wing’ has set up two special police stations-one each in Srinagar and Jammu- to handle the drug abuse and trafficking cases.
As per official statistics, 33,671 -kgs of drugs and 100,951-kgs of pharmaceuticals were destroyed in the crackdown against the illegal narcotic trade network in J&K between January 2023 and June 2024. During this period, a total of 3,190 cases were registered and 4,536 persons arrested “in an all-out effort to break the supply chain”.
In Srinagar district alone, the police registered 94 cases under the NDPS Act and detained 156 persons and booked 26 more under the PIT- NDPS Act in 2024. Also, properties valued at ₹ 4.5 crore were sealed and over 1.7 kg of brown sugar and 2.83 kg of crystal meth seized.
The officials claim that the supplies come mainly from Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) through Line of Control (LoC) and 198-km International Border (IB) called ‘Working Boundary’ (WB) by Islamabad and often referred to as Sialkot-Jammu border by the locals.
According to a report tabled in Parliament by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment in March 2023, nearly one million people were affected by drug abusers in J&K which is around 8 percent of its total population. However, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime recently reported that J&K has sixty thousand drug addicts and that in the last three years there has been an increase of 1,500 percent in the use of drugs in the UT.
Recently, a senior police officer Imtiyaz Hussain while terming the increasing drug abuse as a major challenge for the police and other law enforcing authorities said, “While we have successfully curbed terrorism to a large extent, the drug menace continues to be a significant concern.” He said that besides launching a tough campaign against the peddlers, the police have intensified community outreach programs to identify hotspots and educate the public about the dangers of drug addiction.
Apart from the police drug de-addiction and counselling centres, there are half a dozen such private centres working in J&K whereas more than 1,600 OPDs and IPD at various government and private hospitals and other medical facilities provide treatments to the patients. The website of J&K Department of Information and Public Relations informs, “On the rehabilitation front, the government has taken substantial measures like establishment of de-addiction centres. Other than the 4 drug de-addiction centres of the Social Welfare Department and 21 Health and Additional Treatment Facility Centres (ATFs), the police department has also established 10 drug de-addiction centres”.
Meanwhile, the Srinagar police on Wednesday claimed to have busted a major drug trafficking network after seizing eight kilograms of heroin and arresting two suspected traffickers. The police said that a Tata Sumo vehicle (registration number JK05D 1837) was, during a routine checkpoint at City’s Barthana-Qamarwari Crossing, intercepted and the subsequent search of the vehicle led to the recovery of 6-kgs narcotics hidden under the driver’s seat. Further investigation led to the recovery of another 2-kgs in the possession of the two suspects identified as Anas Ajaz Awan and Zahid Ahmad Sheikh, both residents of Tangdhar in the frontier district of Kupwara.
SSP Srinagar Mr. Hussain said that the preliminary investigations have revealed that the substance was smuggled from Pakistan as part of a larger cross-border drug network. “The seized narcotics have an estimated value of over ₹ 30 crores in the International market,” he added. The officer assured, “J&K police is primed to fight the menace and committed to make J&K drugs free.”
