By mark dummett bbc news, amritsar image caption another day, another drugs bust for the punjab's police in the ruins of an abandoned house close to india's border with pakistan, three friends gather to take smack. They are not down and outs, but students, who we are told are from good families. They live in tarn taran, a typically bustling market town in punjab, one of india's wealthiest states. They burn the brown powder, a low grade form of heroin, over metal foil, and then inhale the smoke it makes though a rolled up 50 rupee $1 note. Punjab has had a drugs problem for many years, but what the student says confirms the widespread fear that things there have recently become much worse.

Image caption a new study in amritsar estimates that 70% of young punjabi men are hooked on drugs or alcohol all sectors of society have been affected, including ones you would least expect. Tarn taran's government run rehabilitation clinic is treating a policeman, two farmers and a professional wrestler. It's as if we're sitting on a time bomb that can explode at any time, said dr jps bhatia, who has run a rehab clinic in the region's main city, amritsar, for the past 15 years. It the rate of addiction is definitely on the rise and it is increasing so much that the scenario at the moment is that of an epidemic, he said. No one knows exactly how many new addicts there are, but a recent study by the guru nanak dev university in amritsar suggested that as much as 70% of young punjabi men were hooked on drugs or alcohol.

While the well off take heroin, the poor take sedatives or other cheap medicines that are easily available at pharmacies, despite government efforts to limit access to them. Historically, india's north eastern region, next to burma and close to the poppy growing regions of the golden triangle, has had the most addicts. But the bulk of the world's heroin now comes from afghanistan, and its main route into india is through punjab, via pakistan. It's as if we're sitting on a time bomb that can explode at any time dr jps bhatia it is a heavily guarded frontier, but cross border gangs know well how to exploit gaps in the fence.

What they do is put the contraband in large tyre tubes and float them across the water so that the person on this side of the border can collect it, said tarn taran's police chief, pritpal singh virk. My seniors are always on to me to catch more smugglers and more drug peddlers and we're doing it, he said. Just as importantly punjab, with its growing economy, has an ever larger number of willing customers. The area's main wealth comes from its farms, and several times i hear stories of landowners selling their property to feed their habit. The middle class and the affluent are the worst victims of this crisis, explained dr bhatia. They are not labourers who don't have to worry about getting up in the mornings. He actually became hooked on heroin in england where he lived for 10 years, and only returned to punjab last year.

Image caption brij bedi, the director of a charity school, says violent drug addicts prowl the streets during the day we encounter drug addicts in the daytime, sometimes they become very violent brij bedi, charity school director he did so because he said the treatment here is much more effective than what he was receiving in london. But while his own experience of india might be hopeful, mr bamber has been horrified to see what has happened to the place while he was away. I was, like, oh my god, what's happened to my home? it used to be so clean but the vibes have changed and i'm so shocked, he said. There was a time when there was prosperity in this state, people were so energetic doing things, trying new things. So many of its men have died or deserted their families after becoming addicted that it has become notorious for being the village of widows.

One woman i meet has lost two husbands, and is now struggling to care for her new one, and her eldest son, who are both addicts. At least there is hope for most of the children of the area a charity school run from the house of the headmaster. Sometimes they try to abuse also, but they don't bother us, we're very bold, we're very strong, we're not scared of them.

Some want to become lawyers to get justice for the people of this area, while some want to become police inspectors to catch those people who sell it. The police know exactly who sells the drugs, but the tragedy is they are helpless. There are many critics of the government, but according to dr bhatia, punjab is now waking up to the problem, and beginning to understand how to treat it. They say that growth always comes from a crisis situation, and so as we have a crisis here in punjab there is growth also.

But he admits that a much greater effort is needed if this problem is ever to be contained. more than 70 per cent of boys and girls in punjab abuse drugs, says survey after nagaland, punjab ranks second in the country for drug abuse. According to a survey conducted by psychologist dr shiv sood, 62 percent of the boys and girls in the age group of 19 24 years are exposed to drugs. These findings came to light in the state level function on international day against drug abuse at government college for boys.

He asked all those gathered to take a pledge that they will fight against drug abuse. Explaining the achievements of the health department, secretary of health, satish chander said: in the past four years we have seized drugs worth rs 11 crores from various parts of the state and to be more vigilant, 34 new drug inspectors will be recruited. Sources in the health department however revealed that the drugs which were seized have not yet been destroyed because the court cases are still going on. The management and storage of these seized drugs are a headache for the drug inspectors, confirmed the sources. Director of health services, dr ashok nayyar admitted that youngsters are involved in drug abuse because of easy availability of drugs, he added: the fake de addiction centres are another nuisance where youngsters are detained illegally. We have raided such centres in faridkot and hoshairpur and have closed down these centres as well.

Drug may also be defined by united nations as any chemical agent that alters the biochemical or physiological processes of tissues or organisms drugs which are consumed as a medicinal remedy or for pleasure leads to many social problems on large scale. One of them involves trafficking which in literal terms means a deal or trade in something illegal. So drug trafficking is the illegal sale, production, transport, movement, and distribution of illegal drugs and controlled substances attained through unlawful means the estimates of the united nations office on drugs and crime unodc as published in world drug report state that in 2011, between 167 and 315 million people aged 15–64 were estimated to have used an illicit substance in the preceding year. An indispensable aspect of drug trafficking is the profits extracted out of this illegal trade. International monetary fund imf estimate profits derived from illicit drug trafficking worldwide at about $600 billion, or 7.6% of global trade. Afghanistan has maintained its position as the lead producer and cultivator of opium.

Globally some 16.5 million people use opiates annually in which heroin is the most abused opiate, with 12 13 million users consuming an estimated 375 380 tones equal to 2,800 tons of opium of pure heroin per year. Opium abuse is also significant, with 3 4 million users consuming some 1,300 tons of raw opium. To talk about the onward trafficking routes linking indiai in 2009, an estimated 15 tons of heroin was trafficked onward from south asia, mainly via india. Of these 15 tons, 6 tons went to south east asia, 6 tons went to africa 1 2 tons went to north america, and 1 ton went each to china and europe. Thus for the last three decades india has become a transit hub as well as a destination for heroin and hashish produced in the golden triangle and the golden crescent. From ferozepur to maqboolpura, a locality in amritsar where most families have lost their men to drugs, the malaise of substance abuse is shredding punjab’s social fabric and no one seems to know where a solution lies. For kulwant kaur, who lost her husband to drug addiction about 20 years ago, life dealt a double whammy.

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