Andhra Pradesh police burn 2 lakh kg cannabis valued at Rs 500 crore

The agency area of Visakhapatnam bordering with Odisha is known for Maoist activity and also notorious for large scale cultivation of marijuana

Over two lakh kilograms of cannabis was set ablaze by the Andhra Pradesh police in Visakhapatnam on Saturday, in what is claimed as the largest destruction of a seized narcotic substance at one place, in one go in the country.

The value of the cannabis, which turned into ashes in no time, is said to be about Rs 500 crore locally. This 2,32,510 kg of weed was confiscated in the last one year.

State DGP Gautam Sawang lit one of the several ganja mounds, heaped at Koduru village in Anakapalli mandal in Visakhapatnam district.

The agency area of Visakhapatnam bordering with Odisha, famous as AOB – Andhra Odisha Border, is known for Maoist activity and also notorious for large scale cultivation of marijuana.

Though ganja was being grown in these forest areas for some years now, the opposition TDP has accused that the planted area has expanded exponentially under the YSRCP rule. AOB ganja is smuggled into Telangana, Maharashtra and several other states across the country.

Such is the menace it has become that the K Chandrasekhar Rao government had to constitute a special police wing to curb ganja flow and use in Telangana.

In this context, the Andhra Police had launched a special initiative – Operation Parivartana in November, following an interstate coordination meeting in Vizag of police officials from the southern states, Odisha, along with NCB and DRI sleuths.

With the use of drones, satellite imagery etc technology and physical crackdown, the police could destroy 7,552 acres of ganja cultivation.

If not, the value of the output would have been Rs 9,251 crore at Rs 10,000 per kg, police officials said.

120 inter state, inter district, static, dynamic, mobile check posts were set up all over Andhra Pradesh. 577 cases were registered, 314 vehicles seized, 1,500 arrests made (572 from other states) and 47987 kgs of ganja was seized – all of this from 1 November to 8 February, officials said.

Parallelly under Operation Parivartana, the police conducted awareness campaigns, rallies in tribal, forest areas to desist the locals from ganja farming.

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