Narcotics racket busted in city, two students among 5 held

Kolkata: Five persons, including two management students, have been arrested for their alleged involvement in a narcotic smuggling racket. The recurring involvement of students in such cases has been on a disturbing rise in recent times, leaving guardians and police equally perplexed.

According to sources in the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), one of the arrested accused used to bring what is known as 'Malana cream', from Kullu Manali area of Himachal Pradesh.

He used to sell the narcotics to the two management students in New Town, who in turn delivered it to another person in Salt Lake.

The person who used to get the narcotics from the two management students, later distributed them among various engineering and management students.

'Malana cream' is a type of premium hashish, which is hugely popular in rave parties held clandestinely in the city, as well as among students in engineering and management colleges. The same substance had been recovered in several previous raids conducted in the city.

According to NCB, Rahul Kumar Singh and Rohit Kumar Singh were the kingpins of the drug peddling racket, who were among the arrested persons. Rahul hails from Dhanbad, but had been residing at a place in West Midnapore.

NCB has recovered narcotics weighing around one kg, the price of which would be almost Rs 9 lakh in the international market.

Around 13 mobile phones have also been seized. The investigators have also managed to trace the bank accounts of the accused, which were used for their illegal transactions.

The arrested duo have confessed that they have been involved in drug peddling and also admitted that they used to engage drug peddlers in some colleges in Kolkata.

According to the preliminary investigation, the NCB officials suspect that apart from Bengal, these drugs are being smuggled to Bihar and Jharkhand as well.

It may be mentioned that in a major breakthrough, NCB in December last year, had arrested drug peddlers from Kolkata, who used to allegedly supply drugs to students of prominent city colleges and in private rave parties.