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Andhra police destroys cannabis worth ₹4,000 crore in special operation
According to Vineet Brijlal, commissioner of the Special Enforcement Bureau (SEB) of the state police, a huge quantity of cannabis, being grown in 6,416.10 acres, was destroyed in a span of 36 days.
A special drive launched by Andhra Pradesh police in the name of “Operation Parivarthan” on cultivation and smuggling of ganja (cannabis) in forest areas of Visakhapatnam and Vizianagaram bordering Odisha has been yielding good results, officers said.
According to Vineet Brijlal, commissioner of the Special Enforcement Bureau (SEB) of the state police, a huge quantity of cannabis, being grown in 6,416.10 acres, was destroyed in a span of 36 days. “The total value of the narcotic substance, as per the present market value, is estimated to be around ₹4,000 crore. This is quite a major achievement,” the official said.
The Operation Parivarthan was launched on October 30, after a series of reports of smuggling of ganja from the Visakhapatnam forest areas into the neighbouring Telangana and Chhattisgarh, rocked the state. These areas abutting Odisha had been known for large scale ganja cultivation – according to official estimates, the narcotic weed is cultivated in more than 10,000 acres, spreading across 250 tribal villages.
At a high-level meeting held in Visakhapatnam in October to take stock of the situation in cannabis cultivation and smuggling, Director General of Police Gautam Sawang expressed suspicion that the tribals in the forest areas were cultivating ganja had the support of the Maoists.
“It has become a main source of revenue for the banned extremist outfit. The Maoists are collecting money from the ganja smugglers to sustain their activity,” Sawang told the reporters after the meeting.
Following the meeting, the SEB has launched the Operation Parivarthan. “We carried a series of raids on the villages in the forest areas of Viskahapatnam, where this cannabis is grown and destroyed the crop,” Brijlal said.
The police took the help of drone technology and satellite mapping to identify the ganja plantations, apart from the field reports from enforcement and intelligence wings.
Special Enforcement Bureau commissioner Vineet Brijlal said the Operation Parivarthan had three main goals: destruction of ganja crops, creating awareness among the tribals on narcotics and crackdown on smugglers and drug peddlers.
“Around 300 teams of 50 personnel each apart from security personnel have been deployed. In its drive against smugglers and peddlers, in the last one month, the police and SEB have booked 214 cases and detained 546 people in Narcotics, Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) cases. More than 100 vehicles have been seized for being involved in smuggling of drugs,” Brijlal said.
The police have also been posting videos of the operation on social media so as to bring awareness among the people. “We shall not stop until every ganja crop is destroyed in the forest region,” the commissioner said.
The SEB authorities are also finding ways to provide alternative livelihood for the tribal people hitherto involved in ganja cultivation. “We are persuading them to given up the illegal cultivation and trade by educating them and counselling them periodically. It has had huge impact on them, as they have voluntarily started destruction of ganja crops,” he said.
Activist M Malini of Chaitanya Sravanthi, working in the tribal areas of Viskahapatnam, said the ganja cultivation in these areas was much more than what police were saying.
“The cultivation has been going on rampantly in the interior tribal areas, which the police authorities do not venture into. The smugglers lure the tribal youth with money and vehicles and involve them in transportation of ganja. Unfortunately, the youth are also habituated to consumption of narcotics. We are contemplating counselling sessions to change them,” Malini said.
