Narcotic drug use has grown significantly in India in recent years, ranging from traditional plant-based narcotics like cannabis, cocaine, and heroin to synthetic opiates like tramadol.
India has developed both a transit point and a final destination for heroin and hashish made in the Golden Triangle and Golden Crescent over the past three decades. Additionally, a variety of pharmacological and psychoactive preparations as well as precursor chemicals made both locally and abroad are trafficked through Indian territory. In addition to breaching India’s borders, the two-way unlawful flow of these narcotics and chemicals poses a serious threat to national security.
The country’s borders serve as the first point of contact for drug trafficking because about more than 70% of the drugs are smuggled into the country through international sea routes, while 20% is by roadway and 10% by air.
Regarding India, many borders exhibit various trafficking patterns depending on the nature of the border, its surroundings, as well as the production, demand, and supply of narcotics, as seen below:
• Pakistan-India border: The Golden Crescent, the world’s greatest producer of opium and cannabis, is vulnerable to the trafficking of heroin and hashish due to its proximity to the India-Pakistan border.
• India-Nepal border: Hashish and marijuana/ganja are the two cannabis derivatives that have historically been transported from Nepal into India via the India-Nepal border. Recently, there has been a two-way flow of drugs and narcotics across the borders between India and Nepal and India and Bhutan due to rising demand for cannabis from Nepal and Bhutan in India and parallel increases in demand for codeine-based medicinal preparations and low-grade heroin in Nepal and Bhutan.
• Border between India and Myanmar: Due to the India-Myanmar border’s proximity to the “Golden Triangle,” rising drug demand among the local population in the North Eastern states, political unrest and insecurity brought on by numerous insurgencies in the area, as well as a porous and poorly guarded border, traffickers have increasingly used this border to smuggle heroin and other psychoactive drugs into the country.
• Border between India and Bangladesh: The India-Bangladesh border has been used to smuggle heroin, marijuana/ganja, hashish, brown sugar, cough syrups, and other substances. Drug trafficking along the India-Bangladesh border is facilitated by factors such as Bangladesh’s high demand for cough syrups with codeine, the border’s high degree of porousness, the area’s dense population, and strong cross-border ethnic ties.
It becomes crucial to protect the borders from invasions by traffickers or terrorists. At the same time, it’s crucial to lower drug demand on local markets. India has taken a holistic strategy to accomplishing this goal by lowering both the supply and demand for drugs and narcotics.
TERRIBLE ADDICTION
The Global Burden of Disease Study estimates that illicit substances killed close to 7.5 lakh persons globally in just 2017 alone. 22 000 lives are thought to have been lost in India. Some estimates place the astonishing value of the world’s drug trade at $650 billion.
HEROIN HIGH
India has 2.3 crore opioid users in 2018, a five-fold increase in 14 years, according to a government estimate. The intake of heroin was claimed to have increased most. More than twice as many people used opium (20,000) as heroin (9,000) in 2004.
Twelve years later, trends began to change: according to the publication The Magnitude of Substance Use in India, the number of heroin users increased to 2.5 lakh, almost twice as many as opium users. The National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre at AIIMS prepared the findings.
CONSUMPTION IN DIFFERENT STATES
According to the AIIMS report, Uttar Pradesh has the most cannabis users, followed by Punjab, Sikkim, Chhattisgarh, and Delhi. India uses less illegal cannabis than the typical country around the world. However, there is a threefold increase in opioid use.
Due to excessive use, approximately 77 lakh opioid users, or more than one third, fall into the hazardous or drug-dependent category. About one-third of these instances originate in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, and Maharashtra.
The northeastern states, however, are at the top of the list in terms of population proportion.
MEDICINAL DRUGS
Numerous pharmaceuticals are also utilised for their sedative properties. There are around 1.08 crore sedative users in the nation, with Uttar Pradesh having the highest percentage, followed by Maharashtra, Punjab, and Andhra Pradesh.
However, the prevalence rate in the north-eastern states of Sikkim (8.6%), Nagaland (5.4%), and Manipur (4.3%) is higher when compared to the native population. In India, around 11.8 lakh sedative users fall into the hazardous or dependent category.