PANAJI: Almost 50 per cent of the alleged drug peddlers arrested for the last three years by the anti-narcotic cell of the Goa police are youth and most of them are Goans.
Since 2014, the ANC has arrested 94 persons under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act of which 43 are in the age group of 18 to 30 years. And out of the 43 accused, 11 are foreigners while 32 are Indians and most of them are Goans.
Apart from this, the ANC has also arrested three overseas senior citizens in connection with drug peddling cases. Of the 94 accused arrested in the last three years, 34 are foreigners and 60 are Indians.
A senior police officer said that there could be a number of reasons for the youth turning to drug peddling.
“One of the main reasons could be easy and fast money,” said an officer adding that “while there are also incidents wherein a youngster first starts taking drugs and later on in the need of money takes up drug peddling”.
Another senior officer said the youth sometimes are also used as carriers by drug peddlers and later on they too start drug peddling.
In December 2016, the ANC arrested four youngsters all from Goa in two separate cases and seized drugs worth Rs 19 lakh.
Two young persons were found in possession of drugs while the other two were their accomplices, the police had said.
Myron Fernandes (24) and his accomplice Dinesh Dandekar (27), both from Assagao, Bardez, were arrested by the ANC at Assagao.
Fernandes was caught for illegally possessing 0.650 grams of LSD papers and 50 grams of suspected ganja worth around Rs 2,02,500 in the international market. The police also arrested Dandekar for accompanying and abetting Fernandes.
In another case, the ANC had arrested accused Gurudas alias Saish Nagvekar (21) and his henchman Anjesh Mandrekar (19), both from Chapora, Bardez.
Nagvekar is into fishing business while Mandrekar claimed to be a student.
Nagvekar was caught with 0.630 grams of suspected LSD paper and 300 grams of suspected amphetamine. The worth of the seized drugs is around Rs 17,00,000 in the international market.
Mandrekar was arrested for accompanying and abetting the offence.
Besides these arrests, in April last year the ANC had arrested two students from the Goa Engineering College Farmagudi-Ponda on charges of possessing drugs.
Vishant Gawas was in final year while Arun Singh Rathod was in first year.
Based on the specific information, sleuths from the crime branch and the ANC had conducted a joint raid at the boys’ hostel at the Goa Engineering campus at night and the two students were found possessing ganja.