Drug peddler held from Pune railway station with mephedrone worth Rs 2 lakh: Cops

The Anti-Narcotics Cell of Pune Police has arrested an alleged drug peddler from Pune Railway Station area and seized mephedrone, also known as Meow Meow, worth Rs 2 lakh. A probe has been launched into the peddler’s supply and distribution chain, police said.

A team from the Anti-Narcotics Cell received a tip-off about a person who was selling contraband drugs in the Pune Railway Station area and the bus stand located next to it. A trap was laid in the early hours of Tuesday and a suspect, Irshad Iqbal Sayyed (42), was detained at 1 am.

At least 25 grams of Mephedrone worth Rs 2 lakh along with an electronic weighing scale, some cash, a cell phone and a two-wheeler were recovered from Sayyed, police said. After preliminary verification that the seized substance was Mephedrone, the man was placed under arrest. He has been booked under provision of Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substance (NDPS) Act, in an offence registered at Bundgarden police station.

Inspector Vinayak Gaikwad said, “We are also looking into the past record of the arrested suspect and his possible accomplices. He has told us that he procured the drugs from Mumbai and was peddling in Pune. We are probing his supply and distribution chains.” The suspect has been remanded to police custody.

Mephedrone is a synthetically manufactured stimulant of the amphetamine and cathinone category. Till the early 2010s, it was not included in the list of contrabands under the NDPS Act. But multiple seizures of large quantities of the drug and rising instances of its consumption as a narcotic in large cities prompted authorities to include it in the list in 2015.