STAFF REPORTER
GUWAHATI: Has the Guwahati Railway Station become a den for criminals? Going by statistics of seizures of various illegal and banned items at the railway station in the last four years the answer has become very obvious.
In 2016, the Railway Protection Force (RPF) had seized 59 cartons of illegal cigarettes worth Rs 9.56 crore, 112 kg of ganja (Rs 5.50 lakh) and 23 cartons of Phensedyl cough syrup (Rs 7.74 lakh) from the Guwahati Railway Station.
The RPF seized 181 kg ganja (Rs1.10 crore), 30 cartoons and 8,585 bottles of banned cough syrups (Rs 2.11 crore) and 229 bottles of illegal foreign liquor (Rs 28,846).
In 2018, ganja (404.5 kg) worth Rs 2,5,32,500 and nine bottles of brown sugar (Rs 18,000) were seized at the railway station.
The RPF has seized 111 kg of ganja (Rs 9.42 lakh), 226 bottles of illegal foreign liquor (Rs 16,580), 7 cartoons of cigarettes from Myanmar (Rs 21 lakh), 500 grams of Morphin and 305 grams of other drugs worth Rs 35 lakh and Rs 22 lakh respectively from the Guwahati Railway Station so far in this year.
Sources in the railway station said there are 25 CCTVs in the entire station premises. The only scanner at the main entrance of the station has been remaining defunct for the last one year.
“We can deploy only four RPF personnel to conduct checking in each train arriving at the railway station. Four personnel to check a long train is not hugely inadequate and criminals take advantage of such slack security checking to make Guwahati Railway Station a transit point to supply drugs, ganja, illegal liquor, cough syrups and banned cigarettes,” the source said, adding that the RPF personnel have limitations in conducting checking of each and every person entering the railway station.
Sources admitted that the Guwahati Railway Station is becoming easily accessible for criminals.