Page 44 - DRI ANNUAL REPORT EBOOK

Production, trafficking and consumption of various illicit Drugs is seeing newer trends across India and World. In Today’s Post-Modern globalised world, instead of knowledge and life values being pursued by mankind, drugs are taking their place and making human life itself void.
Further, Drugs issue does not stop at individual level but has impact across nations and their security. Trade in illicit drugs and psychoactive substances is also intrinsically linked to serious organized crime, providing a stream of illegal financing for criminal syndicates. Terrorist groups are also known to be using drug trafficking for financing their operations, which underlines the connection between drugs and the threat to security.
There has been a significant increase in the global supply of drugs sourced from organic sources like Opium, Cannabis and Cocaine as well as that sourced from synthetic sources.
Continuing innovation in the field of chemistry has led to more psychoactive substances being made available to circumvent restrictions on controlled substances, as also reflected in the growing list of chemicals being put in the list of controlled substances over the years. Still many precursor chemicals and their variants are currently outside the international control regime of drug law enforcement. The demand for synthetic drugs in not so poor urban areas is also increasing as consumption of certain drugs labelled ‘recreational drugs’ by their consumers and suppliers to make it appear less serious crime.
India, with its vibrant chemical industry, continues to be at the risk of becoming a source of synthetic drugs and psychoactive substances including precursors. A number of organized drug syndicates continue to make attempts to use this large industrial base and the technical expertise available in India.
It is imperative, therefore, for the drug law enforcement agencies to keep abreast with changing trends in illicit drug trade, and emerging patterns of substance abuse.
llicit drugs continue to pose a serious challenge as India has been transformed from a predominantly transit country till the beginning of this millennium, to a sizable consumer country of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances now besides continuing to be a transit country. Coupled with this scenario, India also has a large chemical and pharmaceutical industry, which too imposes extraordinary challenge to drug law enforcement agencies in India as a balance has to be maintained between the licit activities of India’s chemical and pharma industry and illicit manufacture of drugs and precursor chemicals, as well as the non-medical use of prescription drugs.
Drug law enforcement in India derives its strength from Article 47 of the Constitution of India, which reads as:
‘The State shall endeavour to bring about prohibition of the consumption except for medicinal purposes of intoxicating
drinks and of drugs which are injurious to health’.
Subjects on which Parliament or state Legislatures can make laws either exclusively or concurrently are clearly defined in the three lists of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution. Vide entry 19, “Drugs and poisons, subject to the provisions of entry 59 of List I with respect to opium.” have been placed in the concurrent list, allowing both Centre and States to legislate in the matters related to it. Entry 59 of List I - Union list reads as “Cultivation, manufacture, and sale for export, of opium”, which is in the exclusive domain of the Centre.
As a responsible member of international community, India has been active in global efforts to tackle the illicit drug menace. India is a party to the three United Nations conventions on drugs – the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, the 1971
10 SMUGGLING IN INDIA REPORT 2019-20