EARLIER drug peddlers in Goa catered to the needs of foreign tourist-addicts. But in recent years, Goa has become a transit point for drugs to be sold to other parts of the globe. For some drugs – for example, the synthetic party drug, the CK1 pill, a combination of cocaine and anaesthetic ketamine – the state is now a production centre. The transformation of Goa from a consumer state to a seller state implies that drug business has consolidated and expanded despite the claims of Goa police and the Anti Narcotics Cell of having contained the menace to a large extent. On the contrary, the menace has acquired such a gigantic proportion that even the Goa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) had to plead for a strong and visible police action, together with joint efforts of Customs to curb the drug trade in Goa. It is not that foreigners alone are involved in the drug racket. Some of the local operators have also joined the trade. In 2006 the Calangute MLA, Mr Agnelo Fernandes had raised the issue of drug racket in the state Assembly and also furnished a list of operators. Crime and criminals cannot survive without the support of local agents.
It is intriguing how the state police remain ignorant of and ineffective against drug operators. The drug mafia and trade would not have thrived in Goa without the support of politicians, police and local people. There is big money in drug business. The main centres of drug consumption are the North Goa beaches of Anjuna, Vagator, Baga, Calangute, Morjim and Ashvem. The decision to set up the second unit of the ANC in south Goa only endorses the fact that drug business has attained serious dimensions. The rise in drug crime has taken place despite government assurances that police have been keeping a strict watch on operators, drug retailers and drug joints.
Significantly, the International Narcotics Control Board in 2005 had released a list of 248 major operators active in Goa. Ironically it does not appear that during these three years the police has initiated any tangible action to break their operational chain. How to explain the remarks of the zonal director of the Narcotics Control Bureau, Mumbai, Mr Yashodhan Wanage that the Narcotics Control Bureau has been in receipt of the intelligence input that consumption and sale of contraband drugs have increased in the recent past in Goa?
Instead of looking at the menace as a tourism-related matter, the government should adopt a more proactive stance. Of course, NGOs should also act. NGOs do not help local people who are fighting drug mafia. There are no gram sabhas or demonstrations against drug traders. It is local people who serve as ‘hiders’ and ‘fixers’. But it is local people again who are fighting the operators of this lucrative trade. The Goa police and the ANC would have to embolden the local people who are fighting without government or big-brand NGO support to drive drug mafioso’s out of the afflicted villages. They have to involve them in intelligence gathering and follow the intelligence with immediate, strong and exemplary action. Only then can this illicit trade be rooted out.
Navhind Times-Goa Daily
