In a major setback to the licensed traders from Mumbai, Delhi and Hyderabad, who managed to register enormous quantity of contracts of importing Khas Khas, seeds of opium poppy, the court has ordered a ban on the registration of any further contracts.
A division bench of Justice Sushil Harkauli and K.N. Bajpayee of Allahabad High Court asked the government to file a reply by July 1, on how Khas Khas import contracts for quantity higher than its global production were registered by the licensed traders in various cities of India including Mumbai, said sources in Mumbai's Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB).
The Director General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) came across a revealing fact late last year that the traders registered contracts and imported Khas Khas, which in fact exceeded the legal production of poppy globally, around 1.6 lakh tonnes, according to UN's 2011 estimates. However, traders from Mumbai and Delhi managed to register 2 lakh tones of import contracts with the government last year, mostly from Turkey.
Considering such unprecedented trend the drug controlling agencies believe that these imports were actually funding the Taliban and arms smuggling in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The DGFT had allowed registration of contracts for import of only 85 tonnes of poppy seeds every year by a single trader between 2002 and 2007, before raising it to 510 tonnes, and post 2010, lifted all curbs on the import quantity. India levies 30 per cent import duty on poppy seeds, but there are no curbs on quantity of their import into the country.
Poppy seeds from Afghanistan, which is declared as bird feed or some other commodity, reach Turkey's free trade zone and the largest sea port Mersin through Pakistan's Karachi or sometimes even through Iran, before they are raouted to India.
Also, since Turkey is in the UN-approved list of countries that can export poppy seed, the contraband from Afghanistan is often passed as Turkey produce. NCB confirmed that the UN's office on drug crime had alerted India last year that Afghan poppy seeds were being smuggled into the country as Turkey’s official produce of poppy seeds was less than 4,000 tonnes last year.
Shishir Prakash, advocate for Ayurveda Shewashram Kalyan Samiti, the petitioner who sought investigations into the import of Khas Khas said, "The HC has issued a ban on import of Khas Khas from certain countries. The court also took note of the fact that poppy import was funding arms smuggling.”
The Central Bureau of Narcotics (CNB), this year received nearly 175 applications for Khas Khas import compared to over 400 last year, said sources.
India's production of poppy seeds, which is concentrated in UP, MP and Rajasthan falls short to meet its colossal demand for seeds. Moreover, the domestic khas khas prices are around 450 per kg, while illegally imported khas khas costs just 150 per kg, said a city based trader.
Since sesame seeds resemble poppy seeds in colour and shape, poppy seeds quite often pass the Customs scanner test if they are camouflaged as sesame. This came to light when the Commerce Ministry website showed that a few traders in India imported sesame seeds last year from countries like Somalia, Sudan, the UAE and Pakistan.