Two men held with charas worth ₹1.20 crore

Mumbai police arrest two drug suppliers in Borivali, seize 3kg of charas worth ₹1.20 crore. Accused brought consignment from Nepal border to sell in the city.

MUMBAI: The Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC) of the Mumbai crime branch on Tuesday evening arrested two drug suppliers in Borivali and found 3kg charas worth around ₹1.20 crore in their possession. The police said the accused got the consignment near the Nepal border and brought it to the city, looking for potential buyers.

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The arrested accused, identified as Rohit Dilip Gupta, 29, and Laxman Hariram Jaiswal, 28, are natives of Gorakhpur district of Uttar Pradesh.

Officials of the Kandivali unit of ANC were on patrolling duty in Borivali on Tuesday evening when they noticed two people who were apparently waiting for someone. After the police enquired about their names and as to why they were standing there, the accused started avoiding us trying to move away. The police then conducted their search and found 500 gm of charas in Gupta’s possession and around 2kg in Jailswal’s possession, said police inspector Rupesh Naik.

Both the accused were brought to the unit office and during interrogation, it was learnt that Gupta came to Mumbai 10 days ago carrying contraband to sell here. Jaiswal, a vegetable vendor, has lived in Borivali for more than a decade and both are from the same village in Gorakhpur and therefore knew each other. After coming to Mumbai, Gupta was staying at Jaiswal’s place, said deputy commissioner of police Prakash Jadhav of the ANC.

Gupta used to run a garment business in his native place and suffered losses and therefore he decided to earn easy money and recover his loss. He came in contact with a drug supplier in Gorakhpur who introduced him to another person from the Nepal border. Gupta picked up the consignment from the border to sell it in Mumbai. He came to Mumbai via train. He was informed that the buyer in Mumbai paid a good amount for the contraband, Jadhav added.

“Gupta has not revealed the details of the potential buyer. We have been questioning him and also were checking his call data records to get the leads,” said Jadhav. Both the accused were produced before a court and remanded in police custody till January 6.

Last year, the ANC arrested a total of 221 drug suppliers in 106 cases and seized contraband worth ₹53.23 crore from their possession. ANC claims that they arrested 29 people last year who were only involved in supplying charas and allegedly seized contraband worth ₹11.44 crore in a total of 11 cases. One of the arrested drug suppliers was Hussain Abdulla Sheergaonkar, 48 from whom the police allegedly seized eight kg of high-quality Charas worth ₹2.40 crore in November 2023.