Nearly 2,500 kilogrammes of methamphetamine worth approx Rs 12,000 crore was seized from a vessel in Indian waters off the coast of Kerala in a joint operation by the Navy and the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), the anti-drug agency announced on Saturday (May 13). According to the NCB, it was the largest methamphetamine seizure in the country, and a Pakistani national was detained in connection with it.
#WATCH | Kochi, Kerala: NCB & Indian Navy seizes approx 2500 kg high purity methamphetamine in the Indian waters that value around Rs 12,000 crores. Police detain one suspect: NCB pic.twitter.com/gxDkZVxhlY
— ANI (@ANI) May 13, 2023
NCB Deputy Director General (Ops) Sanjay Kumar Singh described the seizure as part of ‘Operation Samudragupt,’ which targeted the maritime trafficking of drugs originating in Afghanistan, PTI reported.
According to the NCB, this is the third major seizure of drug trafficking via the southern route in the last year and a half. So far, around 3,200 kg of methamphetamine, 500 kg of heroin, and 529 kg of hashish have been seized as part of the operation, according to the report.
According to the agency, the most recent shipment of methamphetamine from Afghanistan was destined for India, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives. According to the report, the drug cache began on a “mother ship” — a large vessel that distributes narcotics to various boats as it travels around Pakistan and Iran — off the Makran coast.
The Navy brought 134 sacks of suspected methamphetamine, the intercepted boat, and some other items salvaged from the ship, as well as the Pakistani national, to Mattancherry Wharf and handed them over to the NCB, it said.
“NCB has initiated the seizure procedures, and the primary analysis shows that all of the packets contain methamphetamine of high purity,” the NCB said.
The first seizure in the operation occurred in February 2022, when a joint team of NCB and Indian Navy seized 529 kg of hashish, 221 kg of methamphetamine, and 13 kg of heroin from the high seas off the coast of Gujarat, all of which originated in Baluchistan (a region of Pakistan) and Afghanistan, according to the agency.
Following that, in October 2022, an Iranian boat was intercepted off the coast of Kerala in a joint operation by the NCB and the Indian Navy, and 200 kg of high-grade heroin, also sourced from Afghanistan, was seized, as well as six Iranian drug traffickers, it said.
The agency said that the sharing of real-time actionable information generated during the operation with Sri Lanka and the Maldives resulted in the seizure of hundreds of kilogrammes of heroin and methamphetamine and the arrest of 19 drug traffickers in two operations conducted by the Sri Lankan Navy in December 2022 and April 2023.