Police paralyse drug syndicates, freeze properties worth Rs 21 cr

In what appears to be a major step towards paralysing drug cartels in the national capital, Delhi Police claimed to have frozen properties worth over Rs 21 crore, belonging to narco offenders, officials said on Friday.

According to data shared by the police, till September 15 this year, properties worth approximately Rs 21.5 crore — belonging to 30 narco offenders — have been frozen and additionally, financial investigation is underway against 19 narco offenders, involving properties valued at over Rs 5 crore. These figures are the highest logged in the last three years.

The data added that in the previous year, properties worth Rs 5 crore of 28 offenders were frozen, and in 2023, properties worth around Rs 38 lakh, belonging to three narco offenders, were frozen.

Most of these financial actions were taken by Delhi Police’s Anti-Narcotics Task Force (ANTF) of the Crime Branch, which has been at the forefront of integrating financial investigation into all major Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) cases.

“Earlier, our focus was primarily on detecting contraband, making arrests and ensuring convictions. While these remain important, we realised that without choking the financial channels, traffickers would always find ways to re-group and resume their operations,” Devesh Chandra Srivastva, Special Commissioner of Police (ANTF Head), said.

Accordingly, the ANTF has institutionalised a two-pronged strategy, wherein the the ‘top to bottom’ approach of investigation and establishing all linkages is utilised to arrest traffickers, seize contraband, and dismantle the supply networks. Then, financial investigations are utilised to trace money trails, identify assets and initiate forfeiture proceedings, Srivastva added.

Mentioning the technical aspect, the Special CP said, “With the help of NIDAAN, Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU-IND), ICJS and other digital platforms and data bases, we are correlating case data, bank records and communication trails to establish networks.”