Nigerian Sentenced To 15 Years In Prison For Drug Smuggling In India

 A Special Court in Coimbatore has delivered a verdict, sentencing a young Nigerian national to 15 years in prison for smuggling banned narcotics from Delhi to Coimbatore.

In July 2021, officials from the Chennai Zonal Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) received intelligence inputs, indicating that narcotics were being smuggled from Delhi to Coimbatore via train.

Acting on this information, officials from the Chennai Zonal NCB were alerted and deployed to maintain strict surveillance at the Coimbatore Railway Station. Specifically, the officials conducted rigorous checks on train passengers.

During these checks, officials questioned a passenger, Ekwin Kingsley Ugochukwu, a Nigerian national arriving by train, on suspicion. Subsequently, they subjected his luggage to a thorough inspection. This inspection revealed that he was concealing approximately 2.235 kilograms of Amphetamine—a banned narcotic substance—hidden within eight separate parcels.

NCB officials stated that the international market value of the seized narcotics exceeded Rs one crore. Subsequent interrogation of Ekwin Kingsley revealed that the drugs had been smuggled from Delhi to Coimbatore by train, and that he had planned to sell them to youths and employees of IT firms in the city.

Consequently, officials registered a case against the young Nigerian national under the provisions of the Narcotics Control Act, arrested him, and remanded him to judicial custody. The officials filed the charge sheet for this case before the Special Court for Narcotics Control in Coimbatore in January 2022.

After conducting the trial and finding the accused guilty, the Special Court has now delivered its verdict, sentencing the Nigerian national to 15 years of rigorous imprisonment and imposing a fine of ₹1.5 lakh. Welcoming this verdict, officials from the Chennai Zonal Narcotics Control Bureau said, "In this year alone, convictions have been secured against offenders in seven cases. We are taking stringent measures to dismantle drug trafficking syndicates and to achieve the goal of a 'Drug Free India'."