Opposition demands judicial probe in Goa drug trade

The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress have both demanded a judicial probe into Goa's drug mafia, which the opposition has claimed is linked to government ministers.

Addressing a press conference, NCP vice president Trajano D'Mello said that links to ministers in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were surfacing in media reports and only an impartial judicial probe will help unearth the political nexus to the drug mafia in Goa.

"We join the Congress demand for a judicial probe. Let us unearth the drug mafia once and for all," Trajano said.

The joint demand for a judicial probe comes more than a week after the ripples of Goa's drug mafia wars spilled out in the open.

The murder of a Nigerian, attributed by police to a rival drug mafia, had angered his compatriots who laid siege to a major highway blocking traffic for hours.

The subsequent backlash, both by the civil society and the government, on Nigerians even triggered a diplomatic row between India and Nigeria.

Leader of opposition Pratapsing Rane has claimed that if the drug rule in Goa was not combated, then the state could go the way of Mexico and Columbia.

"A judicial probe will be ideal because clearly there is a nexus between the police and the drug dealers," Rane said.

The police have already suspended a police constable for his links to the Nigerian's killers Monday even as seven officials attached to the state anti narcotics cell have already been suspended in the past and are currently being tried for their links to the Israeli drug mafia operating in Goa.

A recent legislative committee probe into the police-politician drug mafia has indicted several police officers including the current director general of police as well as a former home minister and his son.