Around 120 km away from the national capital, in Uttar Pradesh’s Amroha district, an intra-state drug cartel had set up its own manufacturing factory to illegally produce psychotropic drugs. When Delhi Police’s Special Cell sleuths finally raided the factory on May 7, officials said they found 4.72 kg of fine-quality Alprazolam and around 1,570 kg of raw material. Once processed, police said, this would turn into 700 kg of psychotropic substance.
The factory had been set up at a secluded place in the middle of mango orchards in Gajraula inside a house, a large single-storey brick and cement building with an iron gate, built on a “2.7 bigha” plot with three flags – the Tricolour flanked by two saffron flags – fluttering atop.
10 CCTV cameras were mounted on its walls; the factory owner had also put up floodlights to illuminate the surroundings during the night.
However, the factory owner, 45-year-old Sanjay Sharma, who is also the main accused, lived in a rented two-room flat situated 2 km away in Gajraula market. He had come to this area a year-and-a-half ago to start this factory; nobody knew where he was from.
“We never felt there was anything suspicious,” said Jagdish Chandra, who owns a mango orchard near the factory. “I have never gone inside the building… But he used to say that he was preparing jaivik khaad (organic fertiliser),” Chandra added.
On the other hand, Rohtas Kumar, 41, an electrician, claimed he had been inside the factory. “Around a year ago, he (Sharma) contacted me to install an inverter, generator and switchboards… He told me it’s a beej bhandar (seed store)…However, I did spot many machines, glass flasks connected with pipes, beakers, heaters. I didn’t suspect anything, though,” he recalled.
The truth about the factory was revealed only on May 7 when Delhi Police came for a raid. Three men working at the factory — Rachit Kumar (22) of Haridwar, Namit Chaudhary (34) of Bijnor, and Vanga Rajender Goud (49) of Nagarkurnool, Telangana — were arrested. Sharma, meanwhile, went on the run with his wife and two children. He was arrested days later on May 28 from Bijnor. On the same day, police also arrested one Rajvir alias Rajiv Kumar, a resident of Baghpat.
Dr Suraj Verma, who runs a dental clinic adjacent to Sharma’s rented residence, said: “He looked like a priest. There was a long hair knot on the back of his head.”
The villagers said that Sharma had bought a four-bigha land at a higher price in front of the factory; the current infrastructure was built on a rented plot.
Village pradhan Omkar Singh Saini said he didn’t know anything about the factory till the raid.
How the cartel was busted
It was in February that police received an input regarding an inter-state narcotics cartel. On April 25, a police party intercepted a suspicious parcel at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi. The parcel, allegedly containing two kgs of a psychotropic substance, was packed in two silver polyethene packets, covered from all sides by two-three cardboard layers to avoid detection during the X-ray scan at the courier company, and at the airport.
The person who booked the parcel was identified as Rachit and he was traced to Haridwar. On the instance of Rachit, another person Namit who had allegedly supplied him the seized contraband was also arrested. Later, Namit provided intel about this factory in Gajraula.
“Namit used to procure Alprazolam from Sharma and deliver it to Rachit. Rachit packed it and sent these parcels through different courier companies,” DCP, Special Cell, Trans Yamuna Range, Amit Kaushik told The Indian Express.
He said the inter-state cartel was spread in four states — Uttarakhand, Telangana, Delhi and UP.
“Sharma was leading the gang and running the factory. At Rachit’s instance, we recovered a packet containing 1.006 kg of Alprazolam from his house. After this, Namit was also arrested. We raided his home in Bijnor and seized two packets containing 1.71 kg Alprazolam,” Kaushik said.
Kaushik said the cartel was primarily using courier services to send the drugs across the country. “In such cases, it is always difficult to reach the source, the factory where it was manufactured,’’ he said.
Police said that Sharma had earlier worked in a pharmaceutical manufacturing firm from where he received the knowledge of chemicals and their combination.
Later, he joined another pharma company in Gajraula where he worked for around 11 years.
According to the police, a few years back, Sharma met a a person who lured him to manufacture Alprazolam, which can be prepared with the help of various raw materials by setting up a small plant (factory).
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