Heroin smuggler nabbed after eight years

Eight years of a relentless hunt by officials of the Narcotics Control Bureau's Chennai branch bore fruit on Tuesday when they nabbed evasive druglord Ibrahim Khan (45), a native of Tirunelveli, near Mumbai.

Khan, who managed to escape from NCB officials when they seized a huge consignment in 2001, is being brought to Chennai for further interrogation. Three warrants are pending against him in cases involving the smuggling of more than 60 kg of heroin to Sri Lanka.

Since 2001, he had been operating from Dubai and had even developed contacts in Africa, highly-placed NCB sources told The Times Of India. "This is a very important catch. Ibrahim Khan had been controlling the drug trade in this part of the country for over two decades. He sourced heroin from both Central India and Pakistan and smuggled it to Sri Lanka. He was also the major financier for many drug smuggling rackets operating in India," an NCB official said.

Sources told TOI that Khan, during his stay in Dubai, developed excellent contacts in Mumbai and of late had been visiting Mumbai quiet often. "We got information that his family flew from Tamil Nadu to Mumbai to visit him. So we started following his wife and finally nabbed him," the official said.

Khan had his network in place across Tamil Nadu when he escaped the NCB net in 2001. "He was then based in Tiruchi. He never traded in small quantities and remained the backbone of the small drug traffickers by financing them. With his arrest we hope to break the supply chain in this part," the official added.

The NCB had nabbed Sri Lankan druglord K. Gunasekaran in May last year from Chennai. Now, with Khan's arrest, it hopes to make a big dent in the heroin trade between Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.

The Times of India