Bhubaneswar: A narcotic drug trail ended at a doctor’s clinic in Mahaveer Vihar of Jajpur town, much to the surprise of the district police investigating a brown sugar bust, Thursday. Nigamananda Khatua, a dentist, was among three persons arrested for allegedly running a drug syndicate in the district. The other two accused were identified as Sandip Kumar Mallick of Sinduraimuhan and Ratnakar Dixit of Siddheswar in the district. It all began after the Jajpur Town police, acting on a tip-off, carried out a raid near Sinduraimuhan in the district headquarters town Wednesday evening and rounded up Mallick and Dixit. A search of their person led to the seizure of 25 grams of brown sugar.
During interrogation, the duo revealed that they had procured the narcotics from Nigamananda, following which the doctor was arrested Thursday, police said. Jajpur sub-divisional police officer (SDPO) Satyabrata Lenka said, “The dentist is the kingpin of the racket and used to trade in brown sugar in the area.” The SDPO said that police have been keeping a strict vigil on drug peddling and will bring to book those involved in such illegal activities. The three were forwarded to a local court and later remanded to judicial custody after their bail pleas were rejected. Just a day before (Wednesday), a Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) team took a panchayat samiti member and four college students into custody from Jeypore in Koraput district for their alleged involvement in ganja trafficking. A team from the NCB regional office in Bangalore conducted a raid on a rented residence in the Parabeda area of Jeypore, and rounded up the students residing there.
Nevertheless, the involvement of professionals and students in the narco trade, of late, has sent alarm bells ringing in the state’s security corridors and necessitated a complete overhaul of strategy to deal with and bring about a curb in the emerging trend.
Since 2020, the Odisha Police has seized more than 73 kg of brown sugar/heroin, 202 grams of cocaine, more than 116 quintals of ganja/marijuana, and 750 grams of opium. More than 183 drug dealers/peddlers have been arrested in connection with these seizures.