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Chain reaction“Drug addiction is a chain reaction. One person ropes in others into it,” explains Dr Basu.
Vikas, a student of BBA, narrates his dreadful experience of trying to make his batchmates attend a seminar on the issue. “They sought smack as compensation,” says Vikas. “They also forced me to take some pills bought from a nearby chemist.”
Even Punjabi kudis are in the grip of this menace. Kirat, a student of a dental college in Dera Bassi, revealed that many of her friends sail through the strain and pressure of examinations with the help of the “Stuff”. “A cigarette break is quite normal. Pills are provided in a purse if you need more stamina,” she reveals. Girls also prefer cough syrups to other deadly forms of intoxicants. They get their ‘quota’ from young peddlers, mostly boyfriends, who operate in the vicinity of co–educational institutions.
Trading death
Smuggling and narco–terrorism are a natural corollary of drug menace. Youth are able to make a quick buck through drug–trafficking. “We are able to confiscate only 10 per cent of the smuggled narcotic substance. The rest is consumed in the market,” reveals a senior Narcotic Control Bureau officer in Chandigarh. There are recoveries occasionally, but they are not even the tip of the proverbial iceberg.
For several years, Punjab was only a transit point for smack from Afghanistan, which was being routed to other parts of the world or to metros in the country. “Punjab is no more just a transit point now. The Afghanistani smack is being sold here and a large number of youths has taken to it,” says an official of the Narcotics Control Bureau.
The drug trade has increased by at least 30 to 40 per cent in the last year, ever since the cross–border civilian movement has increased between India and Pakistan.
Recently, on Christmas eve, the Punjab Police recovered 50 kg heroin worth Rs 250 crore in the international market from a young brother–sister duo in Phagwara. The Narcotics Control Bureau, Chandigarh, reports that the number of registered cases of heroin smuggling has increased manifold since 1998, and more than 1,200 kg of the drug had been seized during the same period. The data suggests that since 2004 more than four kg heroin has been seized.
The report also suggests that cocaine, charas, methaqualone, ephedrine, acetic anhydride and amphetamine are some of the other drugs flowing in the state. Since the cultivation of poppy is licensed in certain parts of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, drug trafficking from western borders as well oils the drug cauldron in the state.
“International drug cartel and terrorists operating from neighbouring countries are actively involved in drug smuggling,” says a police official. Social activists, however, believe that a police–level drive is not sufficient to deal with the situation.
“The war against drug menace cannot be fought in a piecemeal fashion,” believes Dr Manjith Singh, Professor, Department of Sociology, Panjab University. “People have to wake up to the gravity of the situation. Punjab takes pride in its Green Revolution. Now to rid the state of the malady of drugs, we need another revolution. But no one knows how long it will take.” However, for many like Sukhwinder Singh it is too late.
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Source: The Tribune
