Courts in Punjab are flawed in targeting drug addicts instead of the peddlers
Courts in Punjab are flawed in targeting drug addicts instead of the peddlers
Drug addicts in Punjab are made scapegoats in the drug trafficking menace Targeting drug addicts instead of drug peddlers is just like targeting the terrorist instead of fighting the terror and such is the anatomy of Punjab. With its youth struggling each day, fearing police, death and then being thrown into jails or left to die on the roads of the state; no route has seemed to come to any effect till now. De-addiction centres in Punjab are filled with food, well-ventilated wards, clean toilets, gym, yoga training, recreation room with LCD screen, laundry facilities while the drug addicts who want to get rid of the practice still fear approaching one of these centres. The reason is - Drug addicts in Punjab are made scapegoats in the drug trafficking menace. According to a study by a think tank sending drug addicts to prison instead of rehabilitation would result in turning them into traffickers. The study was introduced in New Delhi in the presence of former union law minister Salman Khurshid, former Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana High Court Justice Mukul Mudgal and former Additional Solicitor General KV Vishwanathan. Despite provisions in the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act allowing people caught with drugs to be sent to de-addiction centres for rehabilitation, the courts in Punjab were sending them to jail, the report said. 'From Addict to Convict: the Working of the NDPS Act in Punjab' also said that between 2013 and 2015, no person brought before the courts in Punjab was directed to de-addiction and rehabilitation through the courts. "The disparity that has emerged in the report is distressing. What is more distressing is the ignorance the judges show by sending the addicts to prisons instead of de-addiction centres. Long spells in prisons lead to interaction with hardened criminals and makes addicts hardened criminals as well," Justice Mudgal said during the launch of the study. The drug addicts are viewed as criminals by the police, prosecution and courts, instead of the complete trouble being a cause of concern, the report said. Justice Mudgal said, "Commercial drug dealers are hardly convicted and this is something that needs to be reversed. Deterrence as a theory does not work," he said. "Instead of reforming him, you are making a very good trafficker when he comes out," he added. "The problem is the entire perspective regarding crime. The only magic formula that we see to address crime is deterrence. There is need to reassess and reexamine the overall concept," he said. The sensitivity of the issue is not understood by the state till now, the very idea of a government-run centre in Mansa's having food, well-ventilated wards, clean toilets, gym, yoga training, recreation room with LCD screen, laundry facilities shows their lack of understanding about the process of de-addiction, it said. As per facts- The government has approved 21 counselling and rehabilitation centres (50 beds each) in the state, out of which 17 are operational, the report has said. Only about 16 per cent said that they had received medical treatment (i.e. medicines to treat withdrawal symptoms) and less than 10% of opioid-dependent individuals received Oral Substitution Therapy. Moreover, Punjab has only 11 Integrated Rehabilitation Centre for Addicts, as against 59 in Maharashtra, 34 in Karnataka and 33 in Odisha. Even though the role of Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment in the process of rehabilitation is clearly defined, the output is unclear. The young generation of Punjab has been hit the most because of failure to effectively implement the NDPS Act. -PTC News
