HP firm partner held in syrup deaths case

The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has arrested Anuj Kumar, a partner in the controversial Kala Amb-based drug firm — Digital Vision — that was embroiled in a case related to a toxic cough syrup the consumption of which had led to 12 infant mortalities in Udhampur in February 2020.

NCB officials had been tracking the whereabouts of all firm owners for the past three months. They traced Anuj Kumar to Roorkee and directed him to appear before them last evening at their Chandigarh office, where he was arrested later. He was produced before a Chandigarh court today, which remanded him to five-day NCB custody.

As per the probe conducted by the agency, M/s Digital Vision operated as the primary manufacturing and supply source in a large-scale interstate network for the illicit diversion of psychotropic substances.

“The investigation has revealed that the firm systematically supplied a huge cache of tramadol capsules and the codeine phosphate cough syrup to fictitious distributor firms in Jodhpur and Dehradun, which existed only on paper.”

Evidence, including seized invoices and bank records, shows that Digital Vision supplied over 48 lakh capsules of tramadol and nearly 12,000 bottles of the cough syrup to these non-existent entities within a year and a half, with payments linked to an already arrested co-accused, said an agency sleuth.

Drugs were diverted for unauthorised sales in Amritsar and its vicinity, besides several places in Haryana. Agency sleuths have termed it the tip of the iceberg and claim more glaring revelations will pour in as the probe advances. Three other firm owners are under the agency radar in this case.

Since earlier none of the firm partners had been arrested in the infant mortality case, it had emboldened them. “The firm continued its manufacturing and stockpiling activities even after the cancellation of its essential MD-VI licence in November 2024 for violating various conditions,” said the official.

The MD-VI licence authorises the manufacture of codeine phosphate-based drugs, including cough syrups.

The owners of Digital Vision were chargesheeted under Sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 274, 275 (drug adulteration with noxious substance) and 325 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt) in an Udhampur court in December 2022.

The firm owners had also been booked under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, and Section 308 of the IPC by the Kala Amb police in March 2020.

• The Kala Amb-based drug firm — Digital Vision — was embroiled in a case related to a toxic cough syrup

• The consumption of the syrup had led to 12 infant mortalities in Udhampur in Feb 2020

• Anuj Kumar, a partner in the firm, has been arrested and sent to 5-day NCB custody

  12 infants had died in Udhampur