Four people arrested with 150,000 yaba pills in Dhaka

Posing as real estate buyers, they traffic yaba pills in luxury cars, an official says

The Department of Narcotics Control (DNC) has reported the arrest of four people with about 150,000 yaba pills in Dhaka.

They were arrested from a private car in Dhaka’s Hatirjheel around 11:30pm on Friday.

The arrestees are Nazrul Islam alias Sohel Rana, 34, Al Mamun, 32, Md Faruk, 46, and Tania, 32, who has been identified with a single name.

Samim Ahamed, deputy director (Dhaka Metro) of DNC, says efforts have been under way to detain the gang for a long time, with several raids having been conducted earlier.

“Despite failing multiple times, the drive was successful this time. We were able to arrest the main drug dealer Nazrul Islam.”

He says under the guise of buying houses and real estate businesses, they traffic large consignments of yaba pills to Dhaka from Teknaf in luxury cars, which are supplied to “wholesale drug dealers” in various districts and elite areas.

Commenting on Nazrul’s involvement in the case, the official said no yaba pills were found during the first check in the private car.

“We conducted a thorough search after failing to find any despite confirmation of the sources. The car's dashboard was newly welded.

“Later, when it was opened, 800 blue zippered poly packs containing 160,000 yaba tablets were found.

“We had to chase the gang for about seven kilometres to catch them,” he added.