: The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has claimed to have busted an alleged drug syndicate which smuggled contrabands by concealing it in religious books to places as far and wide as the United Kingdom and Hong Kong from Nepal via India.
Zonal Director of NCB Rohit Sharma said they had arrested two Indian members of the syndicate -- Noida residents R.B. Singh (50) and Manish Gupta (28) – for facilitating the movement of these consignments.
“The charas grown in Nepal was concealed by creating false cavities on book binding covers of religious diaries. We nabbed the duo after the latest courier parcel containing 6 kg of charas was intercepted by NCB. The contraband was concealed in Buddhist religious scriptures. They have confessed to have sent 25 such parcels in the past one year, earning Rs. 50,000 for each,” said Mr. Sharma.
The consignments were pumped through the land route into India from the Sunauli border in Uttar Pradesh.
But because the concealing was so well, neither the UP Police nor the Sashastra Seema Bal jawans guarding the border could detect it, said another officer.
While the modus operandi was detected a few days ago, it took police a while to reach the accused.
The parcels were booked on identities of unknown people living on fake or incomplete addresses, and the prepaid mobiles used to make these bookings also had SIMs generated on forged identities
The kingpins of the alleged network are based in Nepal, where the charas is grown.
The police are now questioning the accused to find why the kingpins needed to route their consignment through India when they could have parcelled it from their country itself.
The accused have been booked under relevant provisions of the NDPS Act. Efforts are on to trace their accomplices.
The accused used to smuggle contrabands by concealing it in religious books
