In what is being touted as the country's "biggest" drug bust in recent times, the Indian Navy intercepted a dhow off the west coast of Gujarat carrying around 3,330 kilograms of hashish, over 150 kilograms of methamphetamine and 25 kilograms of morphine.
A statement from the Indian Ministry of Defence on Wednesday reported: "The coordinated operation on Tuesday was carried out with the country's Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) following intelligence inputs from the Indian Navy's P8I Long Range Maritime Reconnaissance (LRMR) aircraft over the Arabian Sea.
"An Indian Navy warship was deployed to intercept a suspicious dhow en route to Indian waters carrying large quantities of contraband, based on intelligence received from Indian Navy maritime patrol aircraft and corroborated by NCB inputs. Indian Navy units successfully located, tracked and intercepted the suspicious vessel at sea.," was stated by the Ministry of Defence.
It said that the crew and the seized contraband were taken into custody and handed over the law enforcement agencies on Tuesday.
"This operation is significant, not only in terms of quantity and cost of the seized contraband, but also highlights the collaborative efforts between the Indian Navy and the NCB for disruption of the illegal narcotics smuggling routes, which emanate from the Makran coast (southern coast of Pakistan and Iran) and flow towards various Indian Ocean Region (IOR) countries," the Indian statement noted.