Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (TP)
Udupi, Aug 18: In a major crackdown on narcotics in the university town of Manipal, police have arrested a total of seven individuals — three for drug peddling and four for consumption.
The arrested include two local residents and five persons from Kerala, all allegedly linked to a network supplying drugs to students, industrial workers, and private company labourers in the region.
On August 16, under the leadership of police inspector Mahesh Prasad, Manipal police raided a flat in the Manipal Auto Bar building, near Ishwaranagar Narasinghe Temple Road, Herga village.
Two peddlers — Afshin (26), a resident of Varkala in Thiruvananthapuram district, Kerala, and Shivanidhi Acharya (20), a resident of Indrali in Udupi taluk — were arrested from the spot.
From their possession, police seized 1.237 kg of ganja, 0.038 g of LSD strips, plastic pouches, a digital weighing scale, Rs 2,000 in cash, and two mobile phone handsets.
Meanwhile, based on credible inputs, police had earlier conducted drug-use tests on six migrant workers. Four of them—Ajees (28) from Palakkad, Vipin (32) from Kollam, Bipin (24) from Thrissur, and Akhil (26) from Pathanamthitta, Kerala —tested positive for ganja consumption and were taken into custody.
Cases have been registered against all four under relevant sections.
Continuing the investigation, on August 17, PSI Akshaya Kumari led a second raid at a flat in Vidyarathna Nagar, Manipal, belonging to another accused, Manish (34), a native of Kasargod, Kerala.
Police recovered 653 grams of ganja, two digital weighing scales, a ganja crusher, Rs 3,000 in cash, and one mobile phone handset.
All three accused arrested for peddling — Afshin, Shivanidhi, and Manish — were produced before the court and remanded to judicial custody.
Afshin, a former student of a private Ayurveda college in Manipal, had previously been booked in 2023 for selling MDMA. He is accused of targeting engineering students and workers for drug sales.
Shivanidhi, an engineering student in Mangaluru, is alleged to have supplied drugs to students and local youth in the Udupi–Manipal region.
Manish, a welder by profession, reportedly supplied ganja to migrant labourers arriving in Manipal from Kerala and other states. He also has a previous case of drug consumption registered in Bekal, Kerala.
Udupi superintendent of police Hariram Shankar, IPS, had recently directed law enforcement teams to intensify anti-drug efforts, including conducting drug tests on students and industrial workers. This initiative led to the discovery of multiple consumption cases and the unearthing of a broader peddling network allegedly operated by Kerala-based individuals in Manipal.