Despite being a dry state where drinking is barred, the state has recorded foreign liquor and narcotics worth Rs 606.41 crore seized in the past two years. Relatedly, the 4,000 accused are yet to be arrested.
The matter came to light when, during a session in the Legislative Assembly, Congress MLAs questioned Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel about the status of contrabands seized. The government served a written statement.
More than one crore foreign liquor bottles worth Rs 215.62 crores, 19.34 lakh litres of domestic liquor worth Rs 4.33 crores, 12.20 lakh beer bottles worth Rs 16.2 crores and opium, charas, marijuana, heroin, poshdoda / powder and other drugs worth Rs 370.25 crore, have been seized in the last two years.
“As many as 4,046 accused involved in these crimes are yet to be arrested. Banaskantha, Dwarka, Karach, Chhotaudepur, Dahod and Surat are the main centres for the sale of narcotics. A quantity of narcotics worth over Rs 93 lakh has been seized from Surat, the home minister’s area, in the same period,” shared a police source.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau, the number of crimes under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) in Gujarat increased from 1.29 lakh in 2017 to 3.82 lakh in 2020, a 196 percent increase in the number of IPC crimes. Similarly, the number of offences under Special and Local Laws (SLL) has increased from 2 lakh to 3.18 lakh during this period. The number of SLL crimes has increased by 59 percent.
The government spends thousands of crores on the police and the home department. However, according to the Indian Police Federation’s Smart Policing Index 2021, Gujarat Police is not in the top-5 in the country’s police rankings, it is at 7th. Police from smaller states like Assam, Mizoram, Sikkim and Kerala are also ahead of Gujarat in the rankings.
