AHMEDABAD/CHANDIGARH: The Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) on Monday evening seized 75.3kg of high-quality heroin, valued at Rs 376.5 crore in the international market, from a container at Mundra port in Kutch district, an official said on Tuesday. The contraband, hidden inside fabric rolls to evade detection, had been sent from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and was meant to be transported to Punjab, Gujarat DGP Ashish Bhatia said, adding that no arrest has been made yet.
The Punjab police provided a tip-off to Gujarat ATS that a shipping container which had arrived at the Mundra port about two months ago may contain drugs and the cargo was to be delivered in Punjab, DGP Bhatia said.
"After getting the input, a Gujarat ATS team with Punjab police sub-inspector Komalpreet Singh, reached Mundra and located the suspected container at a container freight station in the port. It arrived at Mundra on May 13 from Ajman Free Zone in the UAE," the DGP said.
The consignment was sent as 'textiles' by a UAE-based company named Green Forest General Trading. It was received by Jovial Container Lines, a West Bengal-based delivery agent having an office at Gandhidham in Kutch. During closer inspection of the 540 fabric rolls in the container, heroin powder was found inside 64 of them, the DGP said.
"Fabric was wrapped on long pipes made of cardboard. The drug smugglers had created a cavity by putting a plastic pipe of a larger diameter on these cardboard pipes. Heroin was filled in the cavity and sealed tightly with carbon tape so it would go undetected in an X-ray check," DGP Bhatia said.
On why no action was taken against the Mundra port authorities, the DGP said it was wrong to pinpoint only the port. "Drug smugglers will use whatever channel they find suitable to send drugs into India. Not just Mundra, we had seized drugs from other Gujarat ports such as Kandla and Pipavav in the recent past as well. Drugs had also been seized from Nhava Sheva port in Maharashtra, in Chennai and West Bengal too," he added.
Officiating DGP of Punjab Gaurav Yadav said, "Punjab part is being explored and investigated." He said that after inputs, the state special operation cell (SSOC), Mohali, had immediately sent teams to Gujarat. To ensure transparency and following NDPS Act guidelines, the consignment was opened in presence of Customs officials and magistrate, he added.
Some suspected persons from Malerkotla and Ludhiana found to be linked with this import of consignment have been called for questioning by the concerned district police to ascertain backward and forward linkages. An FIR under various sections of the NDPS Act has been registered by ATS Gujarat at police station ATS Ahmedabad.
State and central agencies, including the ATS and the directorate of revenue intelligence (DRI), have in the recent past seized drugs worth crores of rupees from shipping containers arriving at Gujarat ports from other countries.
Last September, the DRI seized 3,000kg of heroin, believed to have originated in Afghanistan, worth about Rs 21,000 crore, in two containers at Mundra port. In May, DRI seized 56kg of cocaine, estimated to be worth Rs 500 crore, from a container near Mundra port. In April, Gujarat ATS and DRI seized 260kg heroin, worth Rs 1,300 crore, concealed in a container at the Kandla port in Kutch. Around the same time, Gujarat ATS and DRI again recovered nearly 90kg of heroin worth Rs 450 crore from a shipping container which had arrived at Pipavav port in Amreli district from Iran.
