Chandigarh (Gurpreet Singh): The Aam Aadmi Party launched a sharp counterattack against Union Home Minister Amit Shah following his public rally in Jalandhar, demanding that federal authorities stop using Punjab as a convenient political target and instead confront interstate drug networks flourishing across other parts of the country. Responding directly to Shah’s concluding address at the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Nasha Mukt Punjab Yatra, the AAP pointed to an interception by the Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad and the Indian Coast Guard off the western maritime corridor, which yielded roughly 526 kilograms of heroin and methamphetamine valued at over 3,000 crore rupees. The party contended that the massive coastal seizure underscores how western transit points have evolved into major conduits for synthetic narcotics entering the country.
In an official statement released from Chandigarh on Wednesday, the AAP argued that if the federal leadership were genuinely committed to an anti-narcotics campaign, nationwide efforts should originate where extensive commercial consignments are being intercepted rather than in Punjab. The party maintained that the Bhagwant Mann administration has systematically disrupted conventional peddling networks within the state, forcing operators to relocate operations across provincial borders into neighbouring jurisdictions governed by the BJP. The ruling party emphasized that the traditional narrative attributing the state’s entire problem to the Pakistani frontier overlooks the changing dynamics of modern trafficking, asserting that state law enforcement is now confronting heavily organized domestic supply chains.
The ruling dispensation further noted that roughly 80 percent of diverted pharmaceutical narcotics, including prescription tablets and capsules circulating across regional markets, originate outside Punjab. Consignments reaching consumers are increasingly traced back to industrial and transit belts in Gujarat, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi. Given this interstate dynamic, AAP leadership maintained that federal authorities must hold source states accountable for regulatory and law enforcement lapses instead of turning a national public health crisis into a regional electoral campaign.
Calling for an end to selective political messaging, the AAP challenged the Union Home Minister to address lingering inquiries regarding earlier high-profile federal narcotics investigations, including a historic 6,000-crore rupee contraband inquiry, and explain the sustained influx of shipments along the western coastline. Party spokespersons affirmed that Punjab requires coordinated inter-agency cooperation and cross-border enforcement rather than political lectures, demanding decisive federal action against all interstate trafficking corridors regardless of political jurisdiction.
