Palakkad: In one of the biggest contraband seizures in the state, excise officials seized 36.5 litres of hashish oil worth Rs 36.5 crore at Walayar check post here on Monday. A special squad carried out the raid on a tiff off excise commissioner Rishi Raj Singh received. They arrested Rajesh, 47, a native of Oorakam in Thrissur. He had kept the oil in polythene covers in the hidden chambers of an Alto car.
Assistant excise commissioner M. S. Vijayan led the raids simultaneously held on all checkpoints. “He told us that he brought the stuff from Andhra Pradesh. He has links with different gangs there," assistant commissioner (excise) Jacob John said.
"He had travelled through Karnataka and Tamil Nadu before reaching Walayar and was heading for Kochi. We will have to cross-check information received from him. We will conduct further probe into this network.” Hashish oil is the essence extracted from Ganja, and one kilogram of it costs Rs 1 crore in the open market. But in the black market, its cost would be less, he added.
