STF seized 242-kg heroin, ice; nabbed 522 drug smugglers in past four years

Nikhil Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, August 18

Despite the fact that the Ludhiana Commissionerate has a large number of officers, several special cells and enough infrastructure, it performed poorly in drug recovery. The Special Task Force (STF) wing of the Ludhiana range used to make drug recovery in kilograms while the drug recovery count of the city police, which have a big number of officers, is far less than the STF.

However, the number of smugglers arrested by the Ludhiana police is more than the STF in terms of recovery of all types of drugs and drug money.

Led by Ludhiana Commissioner of Police Rakesh Agrawal and being assisted by several senior officers, CIA, drug units, 28 police stations, the city police are making recovery of drugs in gms only while the STF wing has been recovering drugs in kgs worth crores.

As per data procured from the STF, from March 2017 to till date, it arrested 522 smugglers from the jurisdiction of the Ludhiana Commissionerate, registered 246 cases of drugs and recovered 242 kg of heroin/ice, 1,335 kg of poppy husk, 58.5 kg of opium, 34-lakh intoxicating tablets, 2.97 crore drug money, etc. Despite these recoveries and arrests from the city police limits, the Ludhiana police failed to make such big recoveries.

Inspector Harbans Singh, in-charge, STF, Ludhiana, told The Tribune that the STF would continue to perform better and more smugglers would be arrested to wipe out the drug menace.

“Whenever we arrest any smuggler, we always try to bust the entire supply line by exploring backward and forward linkages and many a times, we have also nabbed main smugglers living in other states,” Harbans said.

Though the STF has only one cell in Ludhiana, it is making huge recoveries of drugs. The STF wing which caters to the Ludhiana Commissionerate, Jagraon, Khanna and Nawanshahr has a staff of only 50 personnel, including the office staff, of which only 25 persons are available for field work.

Former DGP DR Bhatti said the STF was an exclusive agency working against drugs and the Police Commissionerate had lot of other duties such as law and order, other crimes, investigations. However, the Commissionerate should achieve good results in drug recovery.