The East Agartala Police, acting on a specific tip-off, raided the East Aralia area in the outskirts of the capital Agartala (of Tripura) and arrested three drug peddlers. Three thousand bottles of cough syrup meant to be smuggled across the border to Bangladesh were found from their possession, police sources said.
The cough syrups were being loaded into two small cars during the wee hours of Saturday when the Sub-divisional Police Officer (SDPO) Sadar along with his team from the East Agartala Police Station arrested the three smugglers along with 3,000 bottles of Phensedyl, more than Rs 1 lakh in cash, mobile phones, and two cars, informed Debasish Saha, Office In-charge (OC) of East Agartala Police Station.
The arrested peddlers have been identified as Abdul Hashim, Abul Wazar and Subhankar Debnath, all citizens of bordering Sonamura in Sepahijal district of Tripura. Though the price of the Phensedyl bottles are said to be around Rs 3 lakh, but, the price goes up to more than five times once it reaches Bangladesh where it is used as a substitute for liquor, especially by the youths.
Smuggling of cough syrup and contraband through Tripura to Bangladesh was rampant but came down significantly after the new Bharatiya Janata Party-Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (BJP-IPFT) Government came to power. The new State Government launched an anti-drugs operation under its ‘Addiction-free Tripura Mission’ six months back.
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