African in NCB net for carrying 160gm cocaine

Mumbai: The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has arrested a person of African origin from Borivali railway station on Wednesday night, seizing 160 gram of the banned cocaine from his possession. Officials said that the accused was apprehended minutes before he was to leave Mumbai for Delhi with the narcotics.  The accused possesses passports of three countries leading to confusion on his country of origin.

The accused was going to hand over the cocaine to another person in Delhi and as per the preliminary investigation, the seized cocaine was meant for personal consumption. The end receiver of the narcotic substance is yet to be ascertained, NCB officials said.

“Working on a specific intelligence, NCB Mumbai seized 160 gram white coloured substance purported to be cocaine from a foreign national. His age is around 30 years and he was to travel to Delhi with the drug consignment by Rajdhani Express,” said an NCB officer.

The accused was apprehended, following which it came to the fore that the cocaine was sourced from a Latin American country. The accused had bought a ticket of Rajdhani Express from Mumbai Central however he decided to board the train from Borivali to avoid coming into the radar. “We had two teams deployed at both the stations and after he was tracked to be travelling to Borivali instead of Mumbai Central, we began trailing him and nabbed him when he entered the train,” added the NCB officer. The accused has been booked under the provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act and he has been remanded to the custody of NCB for further investigation.

In February, a team of Mumbai NCB had seized around 1 kg cannabis (charas) from Panvel station, sourced from Himachal Pradesh.