Cover Story | Zombie, Meow Meow, Chitta: The Dose Destroying India’s Youth

On a pavement in Chandigarh, a grocery-delivery agent stands frozen in a world of his own. Bent forward, his head slightly tilted and eyes vacant, he appears oblivious to the curious onlookers and mobile cameras surrounding him. A yellow delivery bag hangs from his shoulder, an unlit bidi rests between his lips, and he gently sways back and forth—reportedly for two hours—as though trapped somewhere between wakefulness and an unreachable silence. Around him, life moves on.

The disturbing video from Punjab has been circulating widely on social media since March. Local authorities have remained silent. But similar clips from the streets of the US and the UK have fuelled speculation that the notorious “zombie drug”—a substance blamed for devastating lives in several countries—may have found its way to Punjab.

Days later, more videos emerged from other Indian cities, showing people standing motionless on streets and pavements, seemingly lost in similar trance-like states. For many, the images appear to confirm a chilling possibility: has the “zombie drug” arrived in India?

Authorities in India, however, deny the presence of the dangerous substance—a combination of xylazine, a veterinary sedative, and fentanyl, a potent illicit opioid that can cause profound sedation and potentially fatal respiratory depression—in the country’s drug supply chain. Instead, they attribute such conditions to polysubstance use or opioid dependence.

That may or may not be true. But the official denial has done little to ease public anxiety, or the burden borne by those caught in the grip of addiction.

The latest Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) report estimates that there are more than five crore cannabis and opioid users in the country—about the size of Spain’s population. India is home to the world’s largest population of opioid users. The unofficial number could be higher.

The scale underscores the weight of the burden. From Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Kashmir to Kerala, Maharashtra, Manipur and Mizoram, many states are crushed by it. Over 63 lakh adults and six lakh minors addicted to drugs in Punjab, which has the second-highest number of out-of-school children at around four lakh, are just one among the many shocking statistics.

From posh pockets of the country to small towns and villages where people can’t manage two square meals a day, drugs arriving from across the border are flowing freely. Urban growth, shifting nightlife trends and higher disposable incomes have spurred demand for recreational drugs. Social media makes them seem fashionable. Those who can’t afford to buy the next stash often indulge in petty or heinous crimes.

India’s drug problem isn’t new. But as the economy expands and the market grows, the nature of the illegal trade is changing rapidly and drastically, making it increasingly difficult for law-enforcement agencies to keep pace with traffickers. The modern drug trade now relies on methods designed to evade detection, from darknet syndicates and encrypted messaging apps to increasingly sophisticated supply networks. At the same time, the emergence of exotic, laboratory-made drugs has transformed India’s narcotics landscape beyond recognition in just a few years.

The problem is so grave that it made its way into Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent Independence Day speech. Recognising substance abuse as a “severe national crisis”, he gave a clarion call to every family, NGO and spiritual organisation to unite under the Nasha Mukt Yuva Abhiyan for a comprehensive 100-week nationwide anti-drug campaign.

The numbers spell out the problem. Just last year, the NCB seized over 1.33 lakh kg of narcotic drugs worth around Rs 2,000 crore. The first step for policymakers is cut out—sealing our borders against drugs being smuggled into the country with the intention of destabilising it.

Geopolitical and Geographical Trap

On a sunny morning in September 2021, cranes at Mundra Port in Gujarat were moving with mechanical precision, lifting containers off towering cargo vessels that had crossed the oceans to reach India’s busiest maritime gateway. Among thousands of consignments were two containers declared as carrying semi-processed talc stones. When opened, layer upon layer of carefully concealed heroin, a total of nearly 3,000 kg, stumbled out.

Valued at Rs 21,000 crore, it was India’s biggest-ever drug bust in history, among the most significant finds recorded in the world. The discovery sent shockwaves far beyond Mundra. If nearly three tonnes of heroin could slip into India’s largest commercial port, how much was entering the country without detection? The seizure laid bare the vulnerabilities created by the sheer scale and speed of modern commerce. With thousands of containers arriving daily, only a fraction can be physically inspected. Criminal syndicates exploit the same global supply chains that power legitimate trade. Invisibility is built into the system.

If Mundra revealed the vulnerability of India’s western seaboard, the country’s eastern frontier tells an equally unsettling story. In the mist-covered hilly regions of India’s Northeast, narcotics are transported in backpacks, hidden in vehicle compartments and mule caravans that pass through dense forests and unmanned stretches of the India-Myanmar border. Seizures in Mizoram and Manipur have become alarmingly routine.

Separated by thousands of kilometres, the two ends of the country expose an uncomfortable truth: India’s drug challenge no longer has a single frontier. Patrolling a 7,500-km coastline, 15,000 km of land borders with seven countries, dozens of major ports, hundreds of minor landing points and one of the busiest aviation networks in the developing world is a formidable task.

The fact that India sits squarely between two narcotics epicentres adds to the problem. Comprising Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, the Golden Crescent in the west is historically responsible for the overwhelming majority of the world’s illicit opium production.

Once synonymous with opium cultivation, the Golden Triangle in the east, encompassing Myanmar, Laos and Thailand, is now emerging as one of the world’s largest centres for industrial-scale production of methamphetamine (meth)—a powerful and highly addictive synthetic stimulant that produces intense euphoria, high energy and wakefulness. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has repeatedly warned that the Golden Triangle has become one of the world’s largest manufacturing centres for meth.

Political instability in Myanmar since the 2021 military coup has only deepened the crisis. Weakened border controls are enabling transnational syndicates to expand industrial-scale production of meth while trafficking heroin across South and Southeast Asia. India’s Northeast, with its rugged terrain and a 1,643-km-long porous border with Myanmar, has emerged as both a transit corridor and an expanding consumer market.

Recent drug busts include the special task force recovering 10 kilograms of heroin valued at an estimated Rs 88 crore from a residential flat in Guwahati on August 14. Mundra continues to pose a challenge. In May, the Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad, in coordination with the Indian Coast Guard, seized approximately 115 kg cocaine valued at nearly Rs 1,150 crore from a cargo vessel anchored off the port. The situation on the eastern and western fronts is so grave that during a high-level meeting in June, while describing India’s precarious geographical position, Home Minister Amit Shah said the country is situated between the Death Triangle and the Death Crescent.

Despite a sharp rise in enforcement, with arrests doubling and cases registered under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act increasing, the drug menace remains a persistent challenge. Anurag Garg, director general of the NCB, points to the growing number of requests from state governments seeking the Centre’s assistance to tackle narcotics.

Today’s narcotics trade resembles a multinational corporation. A single consignment may involve Afghan suppliers, Pakistani handlers, Iranian shipping agents, shell companies registered in the Gulf, chemical suppliers in East Asia, financiers operating through Dubai, hawala operators in Delhi and distributors across half a dozen Indian states. Drugs move through shipping containers, fishing vessels, commercial airlines and courier networks, with encrypted digital platforms facilitating the trafficking. Money flows through cryptocurrencies, shell firms and layered financial transactions, often conducted on the darknet—a hidden computer network built on top of the regular internet—designed to leave little trace. From 2020 to 2024, 96 darknet and cryptocurrency-linked narcotics cases were registered. “For decades, India’s anti-drug policy focused on intercepting smugglers and arresting peddlers. That approach is no longer sufficient,” a senior home ministry official says.

Something else is also changing in the drug trade. Traditional charas (hashish) and ganja (marijuana) are passé. Although expensive, people are keen on trying newer, more potent, lab-made drugs arriving in the country from outside. The battle is no longer confined to intercepting finished drugs at ports and borders. It begins much earlier—in chemical factories, warehouses and export consignments—making it one of India’s most complex narcotics enforcement challenges.

Posh Parties, Shady Lanes

A man walks into a grocery shop near a school in Shimla and buys a packet of biscuits. There is nothing conspicuous about his movement. He hides a small pouch of chitta in the biscuit packet and leaves it beneath a small rock. A teenager walks up to the spot, takes the packet and walks away. The two never meet.

Elsewhere, in a metro city, the deal begins with a message that disappears in seconds. Ankit Shrivastava (name changed), a second-year college student scrolls through an encrypted chat, chooses from a menu of pills, hash or “party packs” and transfers cryptocurrency through a digital wallet. Within hours, a courier arrives with a parcel. No shadowy street corner, no furtive exchange, no neighbourhood peddler.

Different socio-economic setups, different kinds of drugs, different payment methods. The drug scene is expanding.

At South Delhi’s farmhouses and Gurgaon’s happening parties, where the music is loud and the guest list is strictly invite-only, the contraband can be remarkably diverse. During a massive raid at a nightclub in Gurgaon three years ago, police recovered a mix of hashish, heroin, cocaine, MDMA and packets of marijuana.

If Mumbai swears by “meow meow”, rave parties in Bengaluru or Goa are incomplete without ecstasy/molly, cocaine or LSD. Chitta is constantly in demand in Punjab and Himachal Pradesh. Pockets of Kashmir need their regular doses of hashish and heroin. Chemical drugs like M-CAT and MDMA, which arrive via ports, see targeted usage among the youth in Gujarat. Meanwhile, Myanmar is quietly slipping meth into the country.

The names are strange; the demand is high. While plant-based substances like hashish and marijuana remain widely present, the illicit drug market has shifted significantly towards lab-made synthetic drugs that are transforming the economics of the drug trade.

Faster production, easier transportation, higher profits—they are highly lucrative for peddlers. They are a hit among consumers too. Mumbai-based Nachiket Deshpande (name changed), who is in his 20s, informs that while one gram of hashish costs Rs 50-100, one gram of MDMA costs Rs 2,500. While synthetic drugs are expensive, they come with a promise of mind-altering effects. Those seeking an escape from stress, wanting to feel energised at a party or looking for a high that avoids detection on standard drug tests, opt for these drugs.

Unlike opium or cannabis, synthetic drugs do not require cultivation. A laboratory can be established wherever there is demand and these drugs can be manufactured using chemicals, says NCB’s Garg. A major challenge is that synthetic drugs occupy a small volume, so tiny quantities can be concealed easily and transported without attracting attention, he adds.

While plant-based drugs continue to dominate seizures by volume, the NCB warns that synthetic drugs represent the fastest-growing segment of the illicit market. The seizure data throws light on the demand—synthetic drug seizures recorded nearly a four-fold increase, jumping from 8,211 kg in 2024 to 32,269 kg in 2025.

India’s pharmaceutical industry has inadvertently become a part of this equation. The legitimate industrial compounds, which helped India’s emergence as the “pharmacy of the world” and made it the world’s third-largest producer of pharmaceuticals by volume, are being diverted to produce illicit narcotics and synthetic drugs. These chemicals can be diverted by criminal syndicates into illicit drug manufacturing if regulations are circumvented through shell companies, forged documentation or illicit rerouting from licensed supply chains. Investigators say traffickers increasingly exploit this overlap between legal industry and illegal production.

With Baddi in Himachal Pradesh being a hub of pharma companies, the state police are keeping a close eye to ensure there are no diversions. Recently, in May, law enforcement and the drugs control administration in Himachal Pradesh raided a godown in Baddi, seizing over 2.23 lakh prohibited opioid and psychotropic tablets.

Even as the authorities try to crack down on synthetic drugs, chitta, which arrives from Afghanistan via Pakistan into Punjab, is spreading like wildfire in the hilly state. Many heroin smugglers and kingpins arrested in the state are linked with Punjab’s border districts, Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu tells Outlook (see page 20). Both Punjab and Himachal are heading to Assembly polls and drug abuse is one of the major issues being taken up by all political parties.

A Threat to National Security

A message arrives on WhatsApp from across the border. A local peddler in a Punjab village near the Pakistan border knows what to do next: collect the consignment and deliver it to a designated location. For each delivery, he can earn Rs 4,000-5,000. The money comes later, through hawala or a maze of bank accounts—sometimes leaving even the account holder unaware of who sent it or why. The routes have changed, too. With tighter surveillance disrupting traditional smuggling channels, traffickers have increasingly taken to the air. According to NCB sources, drugs are being flown across the border on unmanned aerial vehicles operated from bases in Pakistan. Mostly Chinese-made, these drones can carry up to 10 kg of drugs, arms and ammunition.

What appears on the surface to be a drug-smuggling operation is, therefore, part of a much larger security problem. India has long argued that narcotics trafficking is not merely a criminal enterprise but an instrument of asymmetric warfare—one that can exploit the same networks and routes used to move weapons, counterfeit currency and, potentially, militants. There is a precedent for how such networks can converge. A senior intelligence operative points to the 1993 Mumbai terrorist attacks, when explosives were smuggled into India through routes also used by the D-Company. Investigations into several narcotics cases have since pointed to Pakistan-based trafficking syndicates whose networks overlap with those involved in terrorism, arms smuggling and hawala financing.

The concern is particularly acute in Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir. Narcotics have become an important source of financing for militant groups in J&K, while Sikh militant groups in Punjab and insurgent outfits in the Northeast have also been linked by security agencies to drug trafficking.

Punjab, which shares a 553-km international border with Pakistan, sits at the centre of this battle. The state accounted for 58 per cent of all heroin seized in India in 2025, according to the NCB. Amritsar, Tarn Taran and Kapurthala have emerged as key hotspots for consignments arriving from Pakistan and Afghanistan. “The whole business of supplying drugs operates in the form of a nexus through which Pakistan converts drugs into money,” says a Punjab Police source. Nearly 20 per cent of the proceeds, the source claims, eventually find their way back to Kashmir or are routed through Gulf countries before returning to India through hawala channels.

The battle has consequently moved beyond the ground. Since 2021, as border security has tightened, traffickers have adapted by turning to drones and tunnels. Their use has increased sharply along the Kathua, Samba and Punjab sectors, according to security officials. In response, the J&K Police has expanded its surveillance arsenal to include drones, infrared cameras, anti-drone systems, CCTV networks and satellite imagery, even as it monitors vulnerable stretches for illegal opium cultivation. Of the 305 drone-related drug-smuggling cases detected across the country in 2025, 298 were recorded in Punjab.

But Punjab is only one front.

In the Northeast, the prolonged conflict in Myanmar has weakened state control across large swathes of territory along India’s eastern frontier. Ethnic armed organisations and militias control several areas, allowing illicit economies to flourish. Drugs travel into India through a labyrinth of mountain trails, river routes and informal trading corridors before reaching the northeastern states. Security agencies say insurgent groups have increasingly relied on narcotics to finance their operations, while intelligence officials allege that Chinese interests are also involved in pushing drugs into the region to fuel social and political instability. Manipur and Mizoram are the primary northeastern states suffering intensely from the nexus of insurgencies and cross-border drug trafficking, driven by their proximity to Myanmar. Nagaland, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya also act as critical transit corridors and face soaring addiction and localised narco-crime.

Yet behind the geopolitics, the drones, the hawala trails and the intelligence reports lies a more intimate devastation. For every consignment intercepted at the border, there are people at the other end of the supply chain whose lives are being dismantled.

Collateral Damage

At the end of a ceremony held to mark the end of a family’s mourning, Sukhdev Singh, 48, sits with a grief too heavy for words. The grieving father from Chatiwind village near Amritsar speaks quietly, almost as if talking to himself: “He was my second son, Jovan. Barely 17. Younger than Jagjit, who was 21. I lost both my sons to chitta. I carried both their bodies on my shoulders. I performed the last rites of my two children. Now, there is no one left to light my pyre.”

Nearly 200 km away, in Sangrur, Tarseem Lal (name changed) carries the scars of a decade lost to addiction. He was only 18 when friends offered him a cigarette laced with chitta. What began as a moment of curiosity soon became a devastating dependence. Earning just Rs 3,500 a month, he spent most of his salary on drug injections—sometimes two or three times a day. Eventually, he lost his job and his savings. Desperate for his next dose, he began stealing from his own home. He sold the family jewellery. During violent spells, the addiction turned him against the people who loved him the most, and he would beat his mother. His father, watching his son disappear before his eyes, sold part of the family land to pay for his treatment. But even after returning home, Tarseem relapsed. This time, he began trafficking drugs to fund his own addiction. Today, at 28, Tarseem is clean. But the damage remains. Doctors have warned him that his liver is badly damaged and his kidneys are close to failure if he ever touches drugs again. He survived addiction, but he cannot get back what it took from him. Ten years of his youth. Ten years of his life. Ten years he can never reclaim.

Sitting outside the outpatient department of the drug de-addiction department at Shri Maharaja Hari Singh Hospital, Ishfaq (name changed), 28, looks back on a life he once feared he would not survive. Married at 18, his descent into addiction began at 23, after he discovered that his wife was unfaithful. Heartbroken and desperate, he turned to a friend and asked for something that would help him “end it all”. What began as casual smoking soon spiralled into opioids, medicinal drugs and eventually intravenous drug use. Along the way came episodes of self-harm. He had reached a point where he could barely see a way out—until one thought stopped him: his young daughters. That thought became his reason to fight back. Now clean for three years, Ishfaq speaks not with pride about how far he went, but with gratitude that he managed to return. “It’s not worth it,” he says quietly. “You miss out on a big part of your life. I could save myself; a lot of people are not able to.”

Every day, at least hundreds show up at the OPD, men and women, young and old people, most of them hiding their faces behind masks and dupattas. People, especially women, hesitate to seek treatment because of social taboos. Many people are not able to continue treatment once they start, relapses are very common.

Panki Sood’s story is a heartbreaking reminder of how quickly a young life can be changed by drugs. At just 15, he was sent to Chandigarh by his parents with dreams of a better future and higher education. But within a month, those dreams began to slip away as he fell into drug use. When he returned to Kullu, he was pulled deeper into the rave-party culture, eventually trying “drugs of all kinds and forms”. What may have started as curiosity or peer influence cost him 17 precious years of his life—a period that was, in hindsight, the darkest chapter of his life.

The Legal Burden

Justice in drug-related cases is a classic case of small fish versus big hauls. Official data says that 1.2 to 1.8 lakh people are arrested annually under the NDPS Act in India and roughly 600 to 750 foreign nationals are arrested across the country each year under narcotics-related offences. While the arrest of small peddlers and middlemen make headlines, the masterminds sitting across the borders and sending drugs into the country are seldom traced. Drug cases rarely see proper justice because the legal system heavily criminalises poor and small-scale drug users while sophisticated international trafficking cartels exploit procedural loopholes to evade conviction.

Cases of drug-related crimes often involve multiple accused, witnesses and counsel, leading to lengthy examinations and cross-examinations. Setting up special NDPS courts and pushing for speedy trials is a part of the Union government’s strategy to strengthen the fight against drug-trafficking and substance abuse. With close to four lakh cases under the NDPS Act pending across the country, there is an urgent need to set up these courts. Presently, only 65 special courts are functioning across the country; 22 states are yet to set up special NDPS courts. Punjab has about 60,000 pending NDPS cases, yet no special court. Kerala, with 50,000 pending cases, has only two special courts. Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal have a sizeable number of pending drug cases, but there are less than five or no special courts.

Centre, State Pitch In

In 2024, the NCB, the Indian Navy and the Gujarat Police conducted a joint operation in the Indian Ocean codenamed Operation Sagar Manthan-1, which resulted in the historic seizure of roughly 3,300 kg of illicit drugs and the arrest of five foreign nationals. Intelligence sources share that an international trafficking network was busted after intelligence shared by Australian and New Zealand authorities enabled Indian agencies to identify a drug-supply chain before the chemicals could be diverted.

Coordination, not just within agencies at home but also with international agencies like Interpol, is the keyword, considering traditional methods of human intelligence are failing. The government recognises that busts no longer stop at seizures. In order to effectively dismantle entire trafficking ecosystems, agencies must trace digital payments, analyse encrypted communications, identify shell companies, freeze assets and pursue kingpins across jurisdictions.

The “whole-of-government approach” now brings together the NCB, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, customs, state police, the coast guard, navy and financial intelligence agencies. Formed in 2022, the Multi-Agency Maritime Security Group ensures total coordination, intelligence sharing and operational cohesion among these agencies. An important part is played by the Directorate of Enforcement which follows the money. Recently, the home minister took to his social-media handle to inform that the NCB was able to secure the return of fugitive drug kingpin Virender Singh Baisoya from United Arab Emirates thanks to the government’s approach of better coordination between multiple agencies. The government has upgraded its infrastructure. Enhanced artificial intelligence-based surveillance grids, electro-optical devices, night-vision devices, motion detectors and drones for aerial surveillance have been made a part of the wider operation.

India has signed bilateral agreements with 27 countries and memoranda of understanding with 19 countries for combating illicit trafficking, says a senior home ministry official. In addition, a joint coordination committee has been established in an attempt to bring together enforcement and intelligence agencies from both the Centre and the states.

The government has increasingly shifted part of its anti-narcotics strategy into the diplomatic arena. New Delhi has consistently argued for tighter scrutiny of financial networks that enable narcotics trafficking and terror financing at the Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental organisation that leads global action to tackle money laundering, terrorist and proliferation financing. Indian diplomats have pushed for greater information sharing, coordinated investigations and improved maritime cooperation at the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs and other multilateral forums.

This year’s Economic Survey warns that India’s youth, that is hooked to the internet, is low on productivity. Just the fact that this was mentioned in the report card on the country’s economy means that the government is concerned. And rightly so, since 27 per cent of the country’s population falls in the age group of 15-29. If a chunk of this youth spirals into drugs, which, unlike internet, offer zero benefits, it will put a big question mark on India’s future. There are one crore young addicts. The window is not very large. The government is aiming for a Viksit Bharat by 2047—this is a golden period to extract maximum productivity out of youth. Sealing borders to drugs is in India’s interest.

Exactly two decades ago, then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while talking about the problem of Naxalism, termed it India’s “biggest internal security challenge”. India managed to deal with it. Now, the exponential growth of drugs is emerging as a roadblock to India’s Viksit Bharat 2047 dream. The most important question over the next few years will be how soon India can extricate itself from the global narcotics economy.

(With inputs from Zenaira Bakhsh and Mrinalini Dhyani)

Nitin Mahajan is Chief of Bureau, Outlook

Ashwani Sharma is a journalist based out of Shimla