Pramesh Jain
The Narcotics Control Bureau officials on Thursday busted an international drug racket and arrested two persons from Kerala who were smuggling Hashish oil to Doha by international courier concealed in backpacks.
The accused has been identified as,R Khan and his associate S Hussain hailing from Kerala.
Acting on a specific intelligence,a team led by NCB Bengaluru Zonal Unit intercepted and seized 13 backpack bags with 1.2 kgs of hashish oil which were mixed in a total consignment of 70 such bags.
Following the leads the officials arrested R Khan and his associate S Hussain were apprehended at Bengaluru on Sunday and recovered 2.6 kg of Hashish from them.
Preliminary investigation revealed that the syndicate is based in Kasargod (Kerala) and is involved in trafficking of Hashish from India to Qatar,Amit Ghawate,Zonal Director,NCB, Bengaluru,said.
This seizure is in continuation to the seizures of substantial quantities of Hashish already seized by NCB, Bengaluru in the year 2019 and 2020.
The present seizure is an indication that this syndicate which was lying low for over a year due to restrictions in flight movement,have again commenced their operations.
Travel restrictions in Qatar has created a dip in supply of drugs in Qatar and the Kasargod based syndicate is trying to traffic drugs using alternate modus operandi including concealing in couriers and parcels.
This syndicate also caters to supply of Hashish and other drugs to Maldives and Srilanka,This Hashish was concealed in 195 small bags and travel pouches and was meant to be trafficked to Doha (Qatar) by courier.The accused have been booked under NDPS Act he added.
Finally NCB acknowledges the dedicated efforts of Sh.Amit Ghawate IRS (Zonal Director, NCB
Bengaluru) ,Sh Venugopal Kurup,AD and other officers associated to the case at NCB,
