As the Trichy city police reached the special camp to conduct searches at around 6 am on Friday, the inmates confronted the police personnel. A few Sri Lankan Tamils and other nationals sat on a dharna inside the camp and demanded that their mobile phones and other gadgets be returned. One of the inmates argued that he has been inside the camp for over four years and no charge-sheet has been filed in his case yet. According to highly placed police sources, the foreign nationals lodged at the camp— mostly Sri Lankans—are linked to international drug and arms cartels. Sources also say that the inmates managed to get new gadgets, just hours after the National Investigation Agency (NIA) seized them during its search operations in July.
In the last week of July, the NIA conducted search operations at around 22 locations across India including the Trichy Special camp in Tamil Nadu, in connection with drugs and arms smuggling. The agency had registered a sub motto case on July 8, under sections 120B of IPC, sections 18, 20, 38, 39 and 40 of UA (P) Act besides section 8(c) read with sections 21(c), 23(c), 24, 27A, 28 and 29 of NDPS Act. After the searches, the NIA claimed that the camp had turned into a haven for those linked to drugs and arms smuggling.
The agency claimed to have seized digital devices and various incriminating documents linked to drug deals across the globe. “These drugs and arms traffickers have been operating in India and Sri Lanka and working for the revival of LTTE and to further its violent activities,” NIA said in a statement then. It also said that the Lankan drug mafia is being operated by C. Gunashekharan alias Guna and Pushparajah alias Pookutti Kannan in association with Haji Salim, who is a drug and arms supplier based in Pakistan.
In October last year, the NIA had arrested two Tamil Nadu natives Suresh Raj and Soundararajan for dealing drugs and arms. Upon investigation it was found that the two had links with the banned organisation -Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
