Hyderabad: The Rachakonda Police Special Operations Team busted an interstate marijuana racket and seized 320 kilos of the drug from an alleged peddler at Saroornagar here late on Wednesday. The marijuana and a car, together valued at Rs.40 lakh, was seized from them.
Police said the drug was being transported from Gokavaram area of East Godavari in Andhra Pradesh to Bidar in Karnataka via Hyderabad. The arrested person was M.Raj Kumar (28), a driver from Ambedkar Colony in Saroornagar and a native of Bidar. One suspect, Ranga Lal, also from Bidar, is absconding.
According to the police, Raj Kumar usually transports fruit loads from the Kothapet fruit market in his car to various places in the city. Ranga Lal, on the other hand, was into smuggling marijuana from different areas to Bidar. The friends recently met at the Kothapet fruit market, when Ranga Lal asked Raj Kumar to transport marijuana from Gokavaram and offered a share in profits.
According to the police, after unloading in Rajamundry on July 20, Raj Kumar went to Gokavaram, where Ranga Lal joined him and took him to a forest area near Gokaravaram. There, they loaded 152 sachets of marijuana weighing 320 kg in the car, concealing it under empty fruit trays. Ranga Lal then left on an RTC bus asking Raj Kumar to go to Bidar. He was nabbed in a joint operation by the SOT Bhongir and Malkajgiri Zones from near the Kothapet fruit market.
Officials said they had bought the marijuana for Rs.6,000 a kg and were planning to sell it at Rs.10,000 a kg.
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