Mumbai: Mephedrone worth Rs 1,400 cr seized

Mumbai: Mumbai police's Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC) on Wednesday seized 701 kg of mephedrone (MD) worth Rs 1,400 crore and arrested five people. A 55-year-old chemist, who is the kingpin, has also been arrested who produced mephedrone in Nashik and supplied it from a commercial tenement in Nalasopara. This is one of the biggest mephedrone seizures in Maharashtra in a year.

The drugs were seized after a raid was carried out at a drug manufacturing unit at Nalasopara in Maharashtra's Palghar. The manufacturer who was arrested in the case is a post-graduate in organic chemistry, police said.

According to police, the trail into the drug case started on March 29 this year when the ANC's Worli unit arrested a peddler from the Govandi area with 250 grams of mephedrone. After arresting three layers of the syndicate, police arrested the peddler, supplier and then a distributor. The police then finally managed to reach the contraband manufacturer.

Mephedrone, also known as 'meow meow' or MD, is a synthetic stimulant banned under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

"We have arrested the manufacturer who used to distribute the contraband from the commercial tenement that he purchased at Nalasopara. The raid was carried out on information received from some persons arrested in March this year for possession of small quantities of MD," said Deputy Commissioner of Police (ANC) Datta Nalawade.

After the first arrest on March 29, the ANC unit later arrested a drug supplier, also from Govandi, and seized 2.76 kg of MD from him. Further investigation revealed the involvement of two more persons, a man and a woman, who distributed MD in the eastern suburbs of the city. Both were arrested on July 27.