Kochi: School students in the city seem to be getting increasingly addicted to drugs with access to them getting easier over the years. Counsellors and others treating them say they can now have drugs delivered to them at their place of choice with merely a phonecall.
“On an average, we see 10 to 15 cases a week of drug addiction among students. When asked about his source of supply, a Class IX student of a prominent city school said the drugs were freely available as the peddlers sent them to a park or any other place they wanted with merely a phonecall,” says Dr Vivek U, consultant psychiatrist, Renai Medicity.
Dr Anoop Vincent, Associate Professor, SNIMS, Chalakka, believes that the greater restrictions put in place over the last two years to prevent alcoholism among students has forced them to look out for other objects of pleasure like drugs. “The peddling pockets in the city have increased thanks to the floating population, and small ganja packets are being delivered like pizza,” he says.
But access to alcohol too continues as female students who were caught drinking recently said they had got the liquor bottle delivered to them by ringing up “agents” and paying them an extra Rs 30 to Rs 50 for it .
Many city psychiatrists welcome the ‘Clean campus, safe campus,’ drive of the city police which they say is proving quite effective as many cases of students addicted to drugs and other substances are now coming to light as a result of it.
When contacted, Kochi City police Commissioner K J James said the police was aware of peddler gangs operating in the city. “We’ve had some success in nabbing some of these peddlers and efforts are on to zero in such pockets in the city under the Safe Campus project,” he added
