The production of the cannabis has plunged to just about nil in Bara and Parsa districts chiefly as the peasants could not sell last year´s stocks and also partly because of timely intervention by the authorities. [break]
Parsa district alone was estimated to have cultivated the illegal crop in more than 10, 000 bighas of land last year. “Now it is literally nowhere,” said Superintendent of Police (SP) Rajendra Man Shrestha, chief of District Police Office Parsa.
Government authorities, claiming total credit to their initiatives backed by non-government organizations, said this year´s results have paved the way for elimination of the illegal crop from the region.
Meanwhile, peasants interviewed by Republica said that they did not cultivate cannabis this year because they still had large stocks from last year´s harvest.
“We waited for months to get good prices but eventually gave up,” said a peasant from Biruwaguthi VDC. “It is the prices that make us decide whether or not we should go for cultivation of a particular crop.”
A peasant from Belawa VDC told Republica that cannabis cultivation did top their priority list this year as their prices were even lower than those of other normal crops. “We used to sell a kilogram of opium for up to Rs 5, 000 but nobody now offers more than Rs 1, 000,” he added.
While peasants in northern villages of Parsa district still have huge stocks of the harvest from last year, police has seized more than five tons of cannabis in 2010 alone.
“This indicates how much the prohibited drugs could still have been stored,” said officials seeking anonymity.
“We think that Indian racketeers did not outsource opium and cannabis from Nepal this year after finding them for cheaper prices elsewhere,” said an official at Narcotic Drug Control Law Enforcement Unit (NCLEU).
“This is a normal fluctuation,” he said.” The threat of Nepal becoming a major producer of these illegal drugs will not end until and unless there is an integrated approach to educating peasants about substitution crops and to maintain law and order to curb drug trafficking.”
The government´s policy of intervening at the time of cultivation proved effective to some extent this year. “We destroyed seed furrows in three bighas of land. That could have sufficed for cultivation in a vast area,” said SP Shrestha. “It means the racketeers had tried to resume cultivation this year too.”
“Our previous approach of destroying grown-up plants would have invited confrontations as it would have cost the peasants dearly,” Shrestha said.
Shrestha claimed that racketeers have been demoralized also because action was taken against four cops including a sub-inspector for conniving with the drug dealers.
(Upendra Lamichhane contributed to this report from Parsa)
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