How India Gets High

India produces much of the drugs used domestically and exports the surplus. The week takes you inside the insidious drug network, through opium fields and drug markets, and the world of the opium farmer, street peddler and drug-buster

- Namrata Biji Ahuja

Come April, and vast swathes of poppy fields in Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand turn white. The spherical seed pods, with a dusting of white, attracts farmers and fowl alike. Even as birds— high on opium—throng these fields, Salim Khan, 45, an opium cultivator who has been charged under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, heads to his field in the Pratapgarh district of Rajasthan. Here, he worships the white bulbs with incense sticks and prayers, before slicing them open six times for the latex—soft, sticky and bitter—to flow out. It is a ritual practised by thousands of opium farmers across the four states. Miles away, opium gardens in Afghanistan mirror the poppy fields in India as they enjoy a similar season and crop pattern. These fields and gardens provide fertile ground for the narcotics network to bloom far and wide.

Salim is aware of the drug network that buys his opium and smuggles it to Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and further down to Gujarat, Maharashtra and other states. It is in these states that the opium changes hands and is mixed with alkaloids like acetic anhydride to make heroin and other narcotics.

An extensive probe by THE WEEK looks into drug markets and production and supply chains, from farmers to kingpins. THE WEEK found that the atmanirbharta in the illegal drugs industry is unmatched by any other sector. India produces enough for the domestic market and exports the rest. The illegal industry—right from the cultivator to end user, is very much within the country.