Police malkhanas gradually turning into veritable, safe havens for drug cartels

Earlier, the Supreme Court had expressed serious concern and termed the pilferage of seized narcotics from the custody of state police and other authorities across the country as “very serious.” It had appointed Ajit Kumar Sinha as an amicus curiae in order to help the court in tackling drug trafficking and suggest measures to prevent large-scale pilferage of the seized narcotics.

Senior counsel Sinha admitted serious lapses on the part of authorities in storing and destroying seized drugs in absence of proper mechanics. This is because malkhanas, which are under police stations, do not qualify to be a safe place for such substances.

“Possibility of pilferage of drugs in malkhanas cannot be ruled out as there are no ways in which you can monitor the seized substances kept in police stations,” Sinha added. 

Referring to state police efforts to deal with the drugs pilferage, he said: “The system that we have in place is simply not working as no police stations in India have separate storage systems, all seized vehicles and other products are kept in the same place. This is not the way authorities should deal with the substance which are highly toxic and pose maximum threat to our society.”

Sources privy to report told Millennium Post that the condition of current state police malkhanas is alarming. “It is quite possible that every district in all the states very soon will have a separate malkhana under the direct supervision of Districts Magistrate,” said the official.

To identify the weak links in the chain of the procedure of search and disposal of the narcotics, he studied the various useful methods opted by Australia, England, United States of America, Philippines, Kenya, Singapore, Malaysia and Middle East. “Many of these countries have taken the drug pilferage very seriously and resorted to pre-trial disposal that has minimised the threat of pilferage or recycling in open market,” he added.

He further said that the pre-trial disposal will solve the immediate problem of narcotics pilferage as it will not have to be stored for many years. According to law, it cannot be destroyed before the court’s permission and in many cases the trial goes on for many years. 

Earlier, a data was submitted in the Apex Court that has revealed that of the 51.4 lakh kg of narcotics and drugs confiscated across the country over the past 10 years, only 16 lakh kg were destroyed. Following the report, the Supreme Court had observed: “The pilferage of the contraband and its return to the marketplace for circulation is, in our opinion, a major hazard against which the system must guard at all costs, if necessary by making suitable changes wherever the same are called for.”