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Pak drug peddlers use new ways to smuggle heroin into India

Last Updated 28 November 2014, 20:45 IST

Drug peddlers in Pakistan have found new ways to smuggle high-priced heroin into India through the Punjab border.

The seizure of nearly 7.5 kg of heroin by the Border Security Force and the Customs in Amritsar on Wednesday left many surprised. Packets of heroin were found stuffed inside the vacuum brake cylinders of the goods train from Pakistan.

The ploy was “unthinkable,” but security agencies moved in on specific inputs to foil the attempt. The vacuum cylinders of the goods train were cut open to find heroin packets shoved into pipes and hidden inside the brake cylinders.

In fact, the train from Pakistan has been notorious for smuggling drugs into India, just that the modus operandi keeps changing. There have been unsuccessful attempts from across the border to smuggle in heroin in cement bags, camouflaged leather items and even in agriculture equipment which were cut open, stuffed with drugs and later painted and welded back to shape by Pakistan-based peddlers.

 Not just drugs, the train from Pakistan has also witnessed seizure of arms and ammunition. One of the biggest ever seizures of heroin in India was made some two years ago from this train from Pakistan.

 Indian security personnel and customs officials then recovered over 101 kg of heroin, estimated to be worth Rs 500 crore in international market, from the Samjhauta Express.

The heroin was hidden in cement bags. Security agencies ended up recovering over 500 live cartridges from this train. Lakhs of rupees in counterfeit currency, too, had been seized in the past from inside coaches of the Samjhauta Express. If the train route for smuggling drugs is more meticulously planned, sources said, drug smuggling from the fenced border route has often been “crude.”

 Packets of heroin stuffed in hollow plastic pipes have frequently been lobbed over the barbed wire fence into the Punjab side. Such operations have often taken place in pitch darkness or in extreme foggy winter climate.

 Punjab falls in the line of the international drug trafficking zone dubbed the “Golden Crescent”. It is a major transit and destination point for drugs coming from Afghanistan and Pakistan. Since May to November 3 this year, the police have seized a record 240 kg of heroin from various parts of Punjab. Over 9,600 arrests have been made during this period under various sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances  Act.

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(Published 28 November 2014, 20:45 IST)

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