Mumbai’s anti-narcotics cell updating drug dossiers

The anti-narcotics cell (ANC) of the Mumbai crime branch, entrusted with cracking down on the city’s drug trade, has begun updating its dossiers on drug peddlers

The anti-narcotics cell (ANC) of the Mumbai crime branch, entrusted with cracking down on the city’s drug trade, has begun updating its dossiers on drug peddlers, prepared over the past few years, to check their present status. Once updated, these records will be digitised.

The ANC arrested a whopping 19,810 people for drug consumption last year.

In just the past year, the ANC and the Mumbai police have arrested as many as 278 people for possession of drugs and seized drugs worth Rs 12.47 crore from them.

They have also arrested a whopping 19,810 people for drug consumption.

ANC chief Jayant Naiknavare told HT, “I have instructed my men to start updating the present status of drug peddlers. Some have died, some are behind bars and some have given up criminal activities. But there are others who continue to sell drugs. It is important for us to know their whereabouts. We will concentrate on peddlers and the sources of their drugs. We will start with our records from 2015 and 2014.”

Another ANC official, who did not wish to be named, said, “We want to get to the root of the problem. We were unable to nab all peddlers who supplied drugs to the nearly 20,000 people arrested last year for consumption.”

He added, “Once the present status of the peddlers is known, their dossiers will be updated. Soon, we will procure software to digitise these records so they can be made available to all five ANC units.”