AHMEDABAD: International drug lords are desperate to pump in prodigious quantities of heroin into India, officers of security and anti-smuggling agencies said.
The assessment is spurred by two sizable heroin seizures made recently off the Gujarat coast. The officers said the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan has given a ballast of urgency to the drug mafia.
Officers of the Narcotics Control Bureau, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, and the Gujarat Anti-terrorism squad confirmed that concentrated efforts are being made to push heroin produced in Afghanistan into India. The officers said that the smugglers are likely to use the sea route via Iran.
The officers said the drug lords fear confiscation of the heroin stock by the Taliban. Apart from staggering financial losses, the drug lords also face the prospect of summary execution if caught by the Taliban. These factors are fuelling drug runs into India, they said.
Sources in the agencies said the possibility of more heroin ships being caught in Indian waters cannot be ruled out.
“The DRI found about 3,000kg of heroin at Mundra port and the investigation is underway,” a senior NCB officer said. “The heroin was smuggled from Afghanistan, which is the biggest producer of opium. The country has labs to process opium into heroin.”
Such huge stocks were never dispatched by the drug mafia, said the officer. “Their current push shows how desperate they are to dispose of their stock of heroin so that the Taliban don’t punish them or seize the contraband,” he said.
According to the United Nations, harvesting of opium provided about 12,000 jobs in Afghanistan in 2019. It is also believed that the drug trade accounted for up to 60% of Taliban’s annual revenue. The Taliban had in 2000, during their first stint in power, banned opium cultivation. After capturing power this year, they again announced in August that they will crack down on narcotics.
A senior ATS officer said, “The Taliban had been getting money from the illicit drug trade before they came into power.” He added: “Now the opium producers are trying to push the drug into India.” India is not just a receiver of drugs but has also been a route for drug ships, the officer said. .
