Acting on a tip-off, police nabbed a 22-year-old youth and recovered three packets of brown sugar from his possession at Kalyan Nagar under the Sitaramdera Thana area on Friday late night.

The youth identified as Taranjeet Singh who is a resident of Birsanagar near Telco was returning home after buying the narcotic drug from a woman drug-peddler in Kalyan Nagar at about 10.30 pm when he was nabbed and subsequently arrested.

The Sitaramdera Thana OC Anjani Kumar Singh confirmed the confiscation of three packets of brown sugar from a youth late in the night.

"After two women were arrested from the adjoining Chhayanagar while selling brown sugar on November 4, we had spread a message among residents living across the Chhayanagar and Kalyan Nagar to remain vigilant against the drug-peddling in the localities. The arrest of the 22-year-old youth with the drug was the result of our initiative. A section of local residents was watchful about the activities of Bharti Devi and as soon as the youth came to her house, some of the residents had given the tip-off. A police team nabbed the accused watching the suspicious movement of the youth at the exit of the slum late last night," said Singh while talking to The Telegraph Online.

On being interrogated by the police, the youth pointed out that he bought the brown sugar from the woman identified as Bharti Devi. Soon afterward a police team entered into the densely-populated Kalyan Nagar for raiding the house of Bharti. But as there was a commotion at the sight of the raiding police team, the woman peddler managed to escape the urban slum. The police raided her house, but neither was she found nor any stock of brown sugar was recovered from her house.

The OC said they are continuously raiding the house of Bharti Devi who is still absconding.

"If the woman peddler continues to remain absconding, then we will start a process of getting her properties attached by putting a petition with the Jamshedpur court," said the OC.

The police, however, registered a case under relevant sections against Taranjeet Singh and also against Bharti Devi on the FIR lodged by the OC of Sitaramdera Thana, Anjani Kumar Singh.

Taranjeet, on Saturday, was sent to Ghaghidih Central Jail after a Covid-19 test was done on him and he was produced before a judicial magistrate on Saturday afternoon.

Of late, Kalyan Nagar and Chhayanagar which fall under Bhuinyadih in Sitaramdera have come up as hubs for drug-peddlers. A source having knowledge in the drug-peddling activity said that Adityapur Muslim Bustee in the adjoining Seraikela-Kharsawan district used to be a hub of the drug-peddling where a large number of drug-addicts, including girls, used to visit regularly. But after Dolly, a woman kingpin in the drug-peddling was arrested in July this year, several women residing in the slum areas in Bhuinyadih have taken up the profession, giving the youngsters of the steel city to procure the brown sugar from the city itself.

The source pointed out some of the key associates of Dolly had started supplying the drugs active in the Sitaramdera area.