Bihar court jails women drug smugglers jailed for 15 years

The women were bringing narcotics from Nepal hidden in six bags and were arrested on a tip-off by the SSB, which patrols India’s border with Nepal.

A district court at Bihar’s East Champaran has awarded 15-year jail terms to four women who were caught with narcotics smuggled from Nepal in 2016. The court of district and session judge Manoj Kumar Singh also imposed a fine of ₹1.5 lakh on each convict on Tuesday.

Indo-Nepal border is notorious for smuggling of drugs and human trafficking. (ANI)

The case dates back to September 21, 2016, when a Railway Protection Force (RPF) team nabbed the four women -- Ruby Devi alias Shakuntala, a resident of Raxaul; Sangita Devi alias Bagad, a resident of Turkaulia; Pinki Devi alias Sunaina and Rita Devi alias Baby, both from Banjaria, from a general compartment of Satyagrah Express at Narkatiaganj railway station.

According to the special public prosecutor, Suresh Kumar, the RPF team got intelligence input from the 44th battalion of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) that four women were travelling in the train with banned drugs. The suspects were bringing narcotics from Nepal hidden in six bags. The RPF team, with the help of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), seized over 31kg of opioid from their possession.

All the four women were arrested after they could not produce any licence or permit for carrying the contraband and a case under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act was registered against them.

The 1,751-km border with Nepal is notorious for smuggling drugs, weapons and fertilizers, besides human trafficking, data showed. In February this year, three Nepali citizens were arrested with 265 kilograms of charas, hidden in a compartment made in a pickup van, in Gopalganj.

SSB, which patrols the Indo-Nepal border, arrests hundreds each year for smuggling.