Trafficking of narcotic drugs in and through the sub-continent received great impetus with the rise of armed struggle in Afghanistan particularly when the Taliban regime was established in 1996 in that country. Afghanistan is known world-over for the cultivation of poppy from which narcotic drugs are obtained. Taliban actually generated enormous funding from drug trafficking. But only a small fraction of Afghan drugs would be exported to the sub-continent whereas major portion was carried through established channels to the European countries. Despite many efforts of the Afghan regimes including the US-led NATO forces to control cultivation of poppy in Afghanistan, the campaign did not succeed and the Afghan warlords continue to raise enormous funds through drug industry.
In the sub-continent, drug mafia was established across Pakistan, India, Nepal, and Bangladesh being most populated region of the world. As it is a very lucrative trade, and the drugs costing hundreds or thousands at it place of origin, are sold in lakhs and crores at the final destination, large drugs and intoxicant cartels came into existence and on a very vast scale. The State of Jammu and Kashmir could not escape the rapacity of the drug traffickers because it lay in close proximity to geographical region in Asia wherefrom the drug route passed. In the beginning there were only a handful of people on both sides of Indo-Pak border involved in the trade but with the passage of time and with the spreading of militancy in Kashmir, the handlers of the militants, introduced drug trafficking into the entire process of militancy. Thus the floodgates for drug pedaling in our State were opened and huge quantities of narcotics and intoxicants began to be poured into the State.
A cursory look at the record of seizure of narcotics and other intoxicants with the State police will show to what extent the curse of drug pedaling has become widespread in our state. During last year, 588 cases were registered against 863 persons under the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substance Act (NDPSA). A total of 4282 kilograms of narcotic drugs were seized during this period. This includes 75.282 kilograms of charas, 101 kilograms heroin/brown sugar, over 2 kilograms of opium, 3833 kilograms of opium derivatives, one kilogram of cocaine, 28 kilograms of Ganja and 192.250 kilograms of cannabis. However, this is the quantity of various types of drugs and intoxicants that has been seized by the police through raids. It is difficult to compute the quantity of drugs that might have escaped the vigilant eyes of the police and security forces. A new dimension of drug trafficking in our State was found in discovering that secret tunnels were dug across Indo-Pak border in our State by the collaborators, of course, with tacit support and encouragement of Pakistani security forces on their side of the border. Drug trafficking has been linked to terrorist activities in terrorist training camps in Pakistan. It is to augment financial resources of terror.
A discouraging aspect of drug trafficking, as shown by experience, is that the police are not able to strongly defend their position of enforcing the law against drug trafficking when the traffickers are prosecuted in a court of law. Either the law is inadequate or the prosecuting agency deliberately soft paddles on prosecution with the result that after a year or two of prosecution process, the culprit escapes scot free as the law cannot deliver any punishment. Most of the cases are dragged on in the courts of law for many long years for one reason or the other. The net result is that there is huge pendency of drugs trafficking related cases with the courts in the State. Keeping in view the grave threat posed by the smuggling of narcotics and intoxicants and to ensure that NDPSA cases are disposed off as expeditiously as possible, the Supreme Court in a case titled “Thana Singh Versus Central Bureau of Narcotics” on January 23, 2013 delivered a landmark judgment directing all the States to establish special courts to deal with cases registered under NDPS Act. However, despite lapse of three years, recommended special courts have not been established in the State nor has the State appointed Nodal Officers of the rank of Superintendent of Police as directed in the above order of the Supreme Court. The State High Court has been issuing reminders to the State Government but no result is yielded so far. This explains that the State Government is not seriously concerned in controlling the dangerous drug trafficking in the State. Since mostly the youth are attracted to the consuming of drugs and other narcotics, the State Government is inadvertently allowing the youth of State to become drug addicted. Had it not been the case, it would have responded to the instructions of the Supreme Court without loss of a day and saved thousands of youth in the State fallen prey to drugs and narcotics. What a sad state of affairs this is?
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