Officials from the Prohibition and Excise Department seized 44 kilograms of marijuana from two individuals from the Secunderabad Railway Station while they were trying to bring it into Hyderabad from Odisha via train. Officials said that the men were peddling the drugs for the last six months and have been catering to students in the city.
K. Pavan Kumar, the District Prohibition and Excise Officer, said that on Monday around 2 p.m., they nabbed Seshadev Sethi, 23, and Jagannath Prasad Nayak, 33, both residents of Odisha. “The raids were carried out at the Secunderabad Railway Station premises based on a tip-off that the men were smuggling in marijuana. We seized 22 kilograms of dry marijuana from each of them. They had concealed the contraband in their luggage,” said the official.
Officials estimated the street value of the seized contraband at ₹ 11.20 lakh. “They had purchased it for ₹3,500 per kilo and were intending to sell it to students and daily wage labourers for ₹25,000 per kilo in Hyderabad. The smuggling and sale has been going on for the last six months,” added the official.
The arrested accused, along with the seized contraband, were shifted to the Excise Station of Secunderabad and were booked under the NDPS Act.
