Excise sleuths posed as clients to bust Hyderabad drug racket

A month-long surveillance led officials of the Telangana Prohibition and Excise department to the peddlers who ran an organised racket to sell high-end narcotics like LSD and MDMA to their clients, included school students, officials said today.
The officials also posed as customers to small-time peddlers to get deeper into the racket.
The racket was busted on Sunday, in the biggest such action in recent past by the excise department in which 800 'squares' of LSD, each costing Rs 3,000, and 35 grammes of MDMA worth Rs 1.4 lakh was seized.
It also came to light that the gang's clientele included nearly 1,000 customers, including students, a film producer, senior officials of MNCs and employees of IT firms in Cyberabad.

"It was a ground work of 30 days," Prohibition and Excise Enforcement director Akun Sabharwal told PTI today.
After an information on the sale of LSD, a team of excise officials posing as customers approached small-time sellers, who turned out to be teenagers studying in colleges, seeking the contraband.

"We spent Rs 50,000 to infiltrate into the racket and after getting small quantities of LSD we told them that we need more units. It was then that these small-time sellers got us to these fellows who were suppliers of high-end narcotics in and around Hyderabad," he said.
To break the network of suppliers, a new Task Force was raised in the department which conducted extensive raids across the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad.

The task force achieved the breakthrough by busting the racket with the arrest of Abdul Quddos, a private employee, Abdul Wahab, a student, and Calvin Mascrenhas, a musician, who were supplying LSD and MDMA in large quantities.
During investigation, five more persons allegedly indulged in the drug trade were arrested. Out of the eight persons arrested so far, five are B Tech graduates who are working in good positions in multi-national companies (MNCs).
"Calvin Mascarenhas, V Nikhil Shetty and Brendon Ben are the key accused. It was through the 'dark' web that they were placing orders for LSD and getting the delivery of the same through courier. They were also in touch with users through WhatsApp," the officer said.

"This is the biggest catch in the recent past," according to Sabharwal.
LSD, sold in tablets or in liquid form, is known to be one of the most potent 'mood-changing' chemicals while MDMA, commonly known as 'Molly' or 'Ecstasy', is used as a recreational or party drug.
One of the officers of the Task Force, K Pavan, had suffered injuries in his right hand during the operation when the peddlers attacked him.
With the emergence of the disturbing fact that students of schools and colleges were also hooked on to the drugs, the department sent advisories to 26 schools and 27 colleges where it was found that may students are using drugs.

The advisories asked managements of these educational institutions to sensitise their teachers and students.
"We first concentrated on student users. The department has not arrested anyone who is a user or a consumer (although a legal offence under Section 22 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substance Act is made out)," he said.