A man from Odisha was caught in Kolkata carrying 12.32kg of ganja, worth several lakhs of rupees, that he was carrying in a red trolley bag, police said.
Ibram Khan, 33, a resident of Odisha’s Kandhamal district, was arrested minutes after he alighted from a bus at Esplanade in central Kolkata on Saturday evening.
“He said this was his first visit to Kolkata. Initially, he was reluctant to let the officers who intercepted him search his trolley bag. The bag was searched based on specific information and two blocks of ganja were found in it,” an officer of Maidan police station said.
A sample from the item seized was tested and found to be ganja, the police said.
“The consignment weighed 12.32kg and is worth several lakhs of rupees in the international market. The contraband was seized and the case was taken over by the narcotics cell of Kolkata police,” the officer said.
A senior officer at Lalbazar said efforts were on to identify the person or persons who were to receive the consignment.
Many drug dealers use roadways and public transport to smuggle consignments from one city to another, police sources said.
A large number of consumers of such banned items in Kolkata and outskirts are young people, the police said.
Khan has been charged under sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act.
