Mumbai: In an anti-drug initiative, the police on Friday raided 80 hectares of agriculture land under opium poppy cultivation in two villages in Beed district and arrested eight farmers for growing the crop illegally.
Acting on information, detectives from the Crime Investigation Department (CID) raided the agricultural lands and found that where local farmers were cultivating opium poppy on either side of the road at Mohol and Wanjara villages in Maharashtra.
The police destroyed the crop and took into custody eight farmers suspected to be growing opium poppy. More arrests are likely, according to reports.
Investigations have revealed that the farmers in the area have been growing the crop in the last two years. Opium poppy cultivation is banned in Maharashtra.
The Central Bureau of Narcotics (CBN) allows licit cultivation of opium in the selected tracts in the states of Madhya Preadesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. After fixing the Minimum Qualifying Yield (MQY) per hectare, the CBN issues licences to eligible cultivators, who are required to tender their entire produce to the Government at a price determined by authorities. The crop purchased from farmers are tested and graded, before its purchase.
The farmers in the exempted areas are paid prices ranging between Rs 790 to Rs2,310 per kg, the average MQY per hectare is 61.40kg. The opium is sent to the Government Opium and Alkaloid Factories at Neemuch and Ghazipur. These factories are under the independent control of the Chief Controller of Factories.
While a part of such opium is converted to Alkaloids for supply to manufacturers of medicines (about 150-200 tonnes), a large quantity of raw opium is exported for medicinal purposes.
Opium poppy is being grown illegally in several parts of the country, for example in Beed. The cultivators say that traders from Bihar and Andhra will purchase the yield from the farmers.
Sources said that opium has been illegally cultivated in non-exempt areas of Maharashtra and other places for a long time. However, not much is done to check this.
