• IN CONTINUATION TO HUGE SEIZURE OF 312 KG METH AND 10 KG OF HEROIN AND IN YET ANOTHER BLOW TO THE INTERNATIONAL DRUG CARTELS TRYING TO PEDDLE NARCOTICS IN INDIA, SPECIAL CELL RECOVERS 20000 KG LICORICE ROOTS SOAKED WITH HEROIN. • SEIZURE AFFECTED AT THE INSTANCE OF RAHIMULLAH RAHIMI, AN AFGHAN NATIONAL• TOTAL HEROIN SOAKED IN THE LICORICE CONSIGNMENT ESTIMATED TO BE AROUND 345 KG APPRX.• THE CONSIGNMENT OF DRUG LACED LICORICE ROOTS (MULETHI) WAS STORED IN A CONTAINER AT JNPT PORT, MUMBAI WHICH WAS TO BE BROUGHT TO DELHI FOR EXTRACTION AND FURTHER DISTRIBUTION.• TOTAL INTERNATIONAL VALUE OF THE SEIZED CONTRABAND ESTIMATED TO BE AROUND INR 1,725 CRORE.

A team of Special Cell New Delhi Range, led by Sh. Lalit Mohan Negi, Sh. Hridaya Bhushan, ACsP/NDR & Inspector Vinod Badola and comprising of Insp Arvind Kumar, SI Sunder Gautam, SI Yashpal Bhati and SI Dinesh Joshi under the close supervision of Shri P S Kushwah, DCP/Special Cell (NDR) on 16 Sept 2022 has made another major recovery of huge quantity of contraband Heroin that was stored unobtrusively in a container at JNPT Port, Mumbai.

An estimated quantity of approx. 345 Kg narcotic drug Heroin is hidden soaked in Licorice roots consignment of 20,000 Kg.

Police said, team of Special Cell, which has, in the past, severely dented transnational narcotic trade being routed into India through different countries by effecting some mega-seizures viz. 57.2 Kg and 354 kg Afghan heroin in the year 2021, has in 2022 busted yet another International drug cartel with the arrest of two Afghan nationals namely Mustafa Stanikzai and Rahimullah Rahimi recovering from them record quantity of 312.5 Kg Methamphetine and 10 Kg High Purity Afghan Heroin on 03 Sept 2022.

In the efforts to break the entire syndicate, the accused persons were put to sustained interrogation based on the available technical and human intelligence and the material collected during the investigation. The continuous efforts further lead to an information about a consignment of Licorice roots which was stored at JNPT Mumbai. It was revealed that 17 bags containing Licorice Roots soaked with Heroin, 350 to 400 gm per KG (amounting to a total of approx. 345 Kg of contraband) have been concealed among other bags. The total weight of the consignment was 20,000 Kg.

Mr.H.G.S. Dhaliwal, Special Commissioner of Police, Special Cell, said, the concealed contraband is transported in containers to port of a neighboring country, from where it lands at different ports of India. This time the consignment was first transported from Afghanistan to a neighboring country, from where it was shipped to a Middle-East country to avoid detection by the agencies. From there, the consignment containing the contraband blended with legitimate import goods was further shipped to JNPT (Jawahar Lal Nehru Port Trust), Mumbai.

 To verify this information, search warrant of the consignment was obtained from the court and on 16 Sept 2022 a team led by Insp Vinod Badola, comprising of SI Yashpal Bhati, SI Dinesh and SI Rajeev among others was formed and sent to Mumbai. This set of officers while investigating previous cases involving large contraband consignments, had developed a temperament for thoroughly examining such large consignments having drugs in concealed form.

After painstaking efforts, the team was able to locate the consignment. It was learnt that during the preliminary examination by the authorities the entire consignment had already been checked and in the process, the bags of the consignment had got damaged and the Licorice roots were lying inside the container.

The team of Special Cell relying upon the information gathered, inspected the consignment/container from all possible perspectives including the cavity, if any, on the body. Finally, the team started to inspect each and every stick of the consignment which was weighing around 20,000 Kgs in total. It was observed that the color of some of the sticks of Licorice Root was darker than the others. During the nightlong tedious exercise, and a continuous hard work by the entire team, the team was finally able to detect Heroin in all the sticks that were darker in color.

MODUS OPERANDI: Ever Since the team has started to work on the narco modules, various methods of concealment of heroin in consignment have surfaced; sometime liquid heroin-soaked bags used for transportation, while on the other times it was concealed in different legitimate exports like Silica Gel, talc stone, Gypsum powder, Basil seeds and in packaging material like gunny bags, cartons etc. this makes the task difficult for the law Enforcement Agencies to detect and recover contraband being pushed into India in huge quantities.

Mr.H.G.S. Dhaliwal, Special Commissioner of Police, Special Cell, said, the concealed contraband is transported in containers to port of a neighboring country, from where it lands at different ports of India. This time the consignment was first transported from Afghanistan to a neighboring country, from where it was shipped to a Middle-East country to avoid detection by the agencies. From there, the consignment containing the contraband blended with legitimate import goods was further shipped to JNPT (Jawahar Lal Nehru Port Trust), Mumbai.

This consignment was supposed to reach to the makeshift factories based in MP, Punjab, Delhi, Haryana and other states at opportune time for its further extraction/ processing to get the final product Heroin. It is pertinent to mention here that studies have revealed that a person is likely to die if he consumes two Kg of heroin over a period of time.

Considering this fact and the volume of seizure, hundreds of precious lives have been saved with this recovery. This module of international drug syndicate is suspected to be part of a bigger network involving terror links, for which further investigation is under way.