Delhi: Hard drugs sourced from dark web home delivered to college students, 7 including IIM dropout held

New Delhi: Police here on Wednesday arrested seven separate individuals including an IIM dropout, a BBA student and a fashion designer for allegedly sourcing hard chemical drugs like LSD, MDMA and marijuana from abroad using the dark web in order to supply them through courier services to college students across Delhi National Capital Region, officials said.

The arrests came separately after police followed tip offs and narrowed down on the accused following seizure of 28 blotting papers of LSD, 12.6 gm of MDMA, 84 gm of curated marijuana and 220 gm of hashish.

In the first operation, a 22-year-old MBA student was arrested from Wazirabad Road and 84 gm of curated marijuana was recovered from his possession. His supplier was found to be a BBA passout, who was arrested from Chhattarpur, said DCP Anti-Narcotics Task Force K.P.S. Malhotra.

Second gang was intercepted after police, following a tip-off arrested another person, an IIM dropout from Kirti Nagar. As many as 28 blotting papers of LSD and 12.06 gm of MDMA was recovered from his possession. He said he had been dealing in party drugs for the last three years and disclosed the name of his supplier who was subsequently arrested from Paschim Vihar, the police official said. Another accused, who worked as a fashion designer, was arrested from Gurugram on his direction.

In the third operation, two persons were intercepted on Burari flyover when police tracked down their location and they were found to be travelling in a car. Police found 220 gm of ‘Malana cream’ hashish — a drug which is procured from Malana village in Kullu, Himachal Pradesh — was recovered from their possession. Both of them were found to have been booked in an NDPS Act case in April in Himachal Pradesh and had come out of jail on May 2, the police said.

Officials say that they analysed some modus operandi of gangs involved in smuggling hard drugs through dark web websites in order to sell them to youngster studying in colleges of Delhi NCR, “We realised the accused had college students as their primary consumers, further investigation revealed that these are senior students who have either passed out or dropped from college, they first trap them into using drugs then they make them sell it among their friends in college and schools in order to fund their own addiction,” an official said.

The contrabands were supplied to schools, colleges, nightclubs, hotels and multinational companies. They sourced curated marijuana from Russia, the U.S. and Canada through darknet and supply them to their target customers in India, the officer said.

He added that generally, these drugs come to India either through courier route from foreign countries where the consignment is received at the Foreign Post Office or they get transported through roads from Nepal and delivery through domestic courier service in sealed packets.

Since the packets seal-packed, they go unchecked at courier collection offices, making them easy routes for drug smuggling, said the officer.

The DCP said that the arrested men used app-based delivery services to send the consignment to their customers. The customers were asked to order products or food items through delivery apps and the consignment was packed with the product to be delivered to the destination.

“The chatted with their clients through VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol) applications like Wicker and other private messaging applications in order to prevent call tracking and used cryptocurrency for payment on the dark net websites,” DCP added.

What is Dark web?

Dark web websites are usually encrypted in a way that they leave no digital footprint on the internet, they are used anonymously, mostly to commit cybercrimes and procure drugs. “A darknet website issues a false IP address to its user, using a series of relays, in order to mask their identity,” the official added.

Sale and purchase of drugs through darknet is common modus operandi for suppliers of illegal or banned products. “One can change their IP address by using VPN (virtual private network) and get in touch with dealers on the type and quantity of drugs required, following which a deal is struck and the transaction is made, mostly through cryptocurrency,” an officer with the Cyber Cell said.

“We track these websites on darknet and once we detect suspicious activity, we start narrowing down on the user,” he added.

A senior police officer said in drugs trafficking cases, the quantum of punishment increases with the quantity of the drug recovered. “As far as LSD is concerned, 0.1 gm is a commercial quantity and the stringent provision of Section 37 of NDPS Act is applicable where there is no provision of bail,” the officer said.

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