Drugs in Gujarat | The menace of meow meow

That Gujarat was becoming a transit point for drugs has been an open secret for a while now. As is the fact that synthetic drugs form a significant part of that trade. What is becoming increasingly alarming for the security agencies in the state, however, is the realisation that such drugs are now being produced locally—in rundown godowns and abandoned pharmaceutical factories in Gujarat’s hinterland. Among them is the party drug Mephedrone, variously known as ‘meow meow’, ‘white magic’, ‘M-CAT’, ‘bubble’, or MD.Between August and December 2022, the Gujarat anti-terrorism squad (ATS) busted two manufacturing units and seized 314 kg of ready-to-consume MD, worth Rs 1,733 crore, along with several tonnes of raw material and machinery from unused pharma factories in Ankleshwar and Vadodara. The Mumbai Police, too, seized 513 kg of MD worth Rs 1,026 crore after a raid on a manufacturing unit in Ankleshwar in August 2022. The seizure of synthetic drugs as well as the number of arrests—148—were the highest in the past year. The Ahmedabad Special Operations Group (SOG) registered 37 drug-related cases in 2022 alone, of which over 50 per cent were MD-related. In total, 22 cases of MD have been registered in the city post January 2022—at least one, and up to three every month, as against none before that, per Jayrajsinh Vala, deputy commissioner of police, SOG, Ahmedabad. Ironically, Ahmedabad had reported 37 cases in total in the five years from 2017 and 2021. An odourless, white, powdery substance, MD can be mixed with ‘gutka’, taken with alcohol, snorted, wrapped in paper and swallowed, or ‘bombed’. “It leads to hallucinations,” says a seasoned Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) cop. “One feels like they are literally flying.” This high is what makes it a popular party drug. It can also be consumed in full public view, since it has no smell or smoke, and therefore does not arouse any suspicion. Compare this with heroin, which requires a syringe, or cocaine, which needs to be snorted and has a distinct odour, or ganja and charas, which need a chillum, or even cough syrups, where the trail of empty bottles can possibly lead to their inebriated consumer.MD doesn’t come cheap, though. The street price for a gram is Rs 1,000-Rs 3,000, which makes it among the most expensive narcotics in the market right now. It is also highly addictive. “Alcohol takes years to get addicted to, drugs take days,” says Ajit Pawar, a Mumbai-based addiction therapist who regularly sees patients from Gujarat. Drug addiction is more rampant than alcoholism, he claims. MD addiction is also lethal. “It kills in 2.5-3 years.”Mephedrone is a drug that was banned in India in 2015 under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances or the NDPS Act (see MD: A Fact Sheet). However, both producing it and consuming it are easy. To begin with, most of the 8-10 chemicals used as raw materials can be procured over-the-counter. MD doesn’t need any of the seven chemicals that the NCB controls under the NDPS Act. While these seven chemicals are legitimately used in many industries such as dyes, printing and pharma, they also find illegitimate use in the production of semi-synthetic drugs such as heroin. However, they are so heavily controlled that it’s not easy to traffic them. Enter MD. Investigating agencies have demanded that similar rules be put in place for MD chemicals, but pharma and allied industries have resisted it, claiming that such restrictions and allied expenditures reduce their competitiveness. That apart, MD’s manufacture does not require much equipment, even an average chemist can prepare it in a jiffy. The instructions for the process can be found online. However, the very simplicity of manufacturing leaves it susceptible to spurious content. Gujarat is the hub of API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients) manufacturing in the country. The abundance of dilapidated factory units in industrial belts gives MD manufacturers excellent cover, with even temporary sheds enough for their clandestine pursuits. “It is so rudimentary that they can see police teams approach from a distance and escape,” says a police officer. And the profit margin is on the order of 10 times. As a source from the NCB reveals, “The manufacturing price of a kilogram of MD is Rs 10,000. The street price is Rs 10 lakh per kilogram.”Local manufacture apart, ready-to-sell MD also comes to Gujarat from Pratapgarh, Barmer and Sanchore in Rajasthan, and from Mumbai. “Though it is not yet clear whether there is an international syndicate or cartel behind it, we are treating this as organised crime,” says Deepan Bhadran, deputy inspector general of police, Gujarat ATS. MD manufactured in Gujarat, on the other hand, finds its way to Punjab, Mumbai, Delhi and Dubai. Source: Office of DGP, Gujarat; Graphic: Tanmoy Chakraborty Manufacturers also plug into the sales network of drug traffickers who are doing time in jail. Peddlers and suppliers are often connected through a stealth network and may not be familiar with each other. In some isolated cases, the dark web is also used. Then there are the ‘carriers’, or people who transport the drugs, possibly without knowing the contents of the package. Sometimes, many addicts turn peddlers themselves to sustain their addiction, says Vala.UDTA GUJARAT?The reason why MD is becoming a popular drug in India is that the two most commonly consumed drugs in the country, ganja and charas, have become difficult to procure due to strict crackdowns in recent years. Following the abolition of Article 370 in 2019, central agencies have tightened the curbs on movement in Kashmir. Thus, the flow of charas from Kashmir to the rest of the country has also been choked.Though exact numbers are hard to come by, there is no denying the rise in MD addiction. Addiction therapist Pawar says he has been seeing MD patients for nine years, but the numbers have increased in the past few years. “I am counselling a young CA student who has accumulated lakhs of rupees of debt under MD addiction. He is precariously close to committing a crime every day,” he says.Authorities are also concerned that a growing number of women may be getting addicted to MD. In Ahmedabad city alone, the SOG in the last year arrested nine women peddlers in total, of whom one is absconding. Among them is 52-year-old Ameena Pathan, a hardened criminal who has spent almost a decade in jail for drug-related cases. Another young middle-class Amritsar-based woman working with an event management company was tricked into addiction and became a peddler. She was caught on the streets of Ahmedabad selling 15.5 gm of MD worth Rs 1.55 lakh. THE WAY OUTIn view of its rising menace, security agencies in Gujarat have stepped up their vigil against MD. State authorities have, in fact, been on high alert since 2018, when intelligence was received from central agencies that Gujarat had emerged as a transit point for drugs. Heroin seizures revealed that the consignments were often headed for the international market. “The drugs are produced in Pakistan-Afghanistan. They then reach Iran, where the consignments are broken down into smaller quantities, concealed, camouflaged and shipped to India,” says a senior NCB official. Ashish Bhatia, former director general of police, Gujarat, says, “The Union home ministry has issued strict instructions to have zero tolerance to drugs. We have been on hyper alert for the past two years.” All hands are on deck: almost half of all district SOGs, the ATS, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), local police, the NCB, Coast Guard (CG), Navy and their intelligence wings. “The DRI has helped us in seizures coming from ports like Kandla, Mundra and Pipavav, and CG has busted several drug transport ships on the high seas. We have regular virtual meetings with heads of these agencies of all western states, which are sometimes attended by the state’s chief ministers too,” says Bhatia. Also, the senior NCB official adds, “Now that Indian probe agencies have tightened controls, usage of India as a transit route is also reducing.”Funding is another aspect that investigating agencies are hoping to tighten the noose around. “We are going to the root of funding in each case, which has led us to conduct raids in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Delhi and Kolkata. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) is investigating funding in two cases,” says Bhatia. He points to the danger of the drug trade facilitating the entry of Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICN) into the market. Cryptocurrencies are also used for drug transactions. “We have traced crypto transactions from California to New Zealand.” MANY MEPHEDRONE ADDICTS TURN DRUG PEDDLERS THEMSELVES TO SUSTAIN THEIR ADDICTION Where the investigating agencies fumble is the NDPS Act itself. “The commercial quantity of MD is 50 gm. That means a person possessing this quantity shall be jailed for at least 10 years. Ganja’s commercial quantity is 20 kg,” says NCB Ahmedabad zonal director Shailendra Mishra. So stringent are the pre-arrest procedures of the NDPS Act that non-NCB officials are scared of invoking it. A senior officer in the Gujarat police admits that prior to 2018, the local police did not register drug-related cases under the NDPS Act. Officers of the NCB say that one wrong move in registering a case under the NDPS Act can jeopardise the case and invite strictures, which makes the police apprehensive. Investigators, thus, always have an eye on the big traffickers, or, in the case of MD, manufacturers. “After the Union Home ministry’s directive, state agencies got training from NCB to file cases under the NDPS Act as the intelligence network of the local police is robust,” says the officer. The increased efficiency of the investigating agencies could be one reason why more drug-related cases are coming to light.However, while action is welcome, every bust leads to an increase in the street price of contraband, putting further stress on addicts. Mishra advocates a three-pronged approach to safeguard society from drugs: supply, harm and demand. While supply reduction is interdiction, harm reduction is about rehabilitation. The most important task, however, is demand reduction. “As long as there is demand, supply will find a way. Sensitising the youth, particularly in schools and colleges, is the most effective way to counter drug abuse,” he says.Can Gujarat cope with the Mephedrone scourge? Perhaps, but it’s not seizures alone that will cut it. The real rot runs far deeper.Published By: Aditya Mohan WigPublished On: Feb 17, 2023--- ENDS ---

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Drugs in Gujarat | The menace of meow meow

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