Church indicts Goa government for shielding drug traders

PANAJI - After the opposition and the local media, the Goa Roman Catholic Church has indicted the Congress-led government for failing to curb the drug trade and for shielding the police-politician-drug mafia nexus.

The state police machinery was entangled with drug peddlers and the Digambar Kamat-led government was “not honest about probing the (police-politician-drug mafia) nexus”, Father Maverick Fernandes, executive secretary of the Council for Social Justice and Peace (CSJP), a social arm of the Roman Catholic church in Goa, told IANS.

“The press has covered enough of how the men in uniform are involved with the drug peddlers. Law enforcement officers are themselves involved or assisting in this trend,” said Maverick, a respected voice in the social and religious sphere in the state.

“The government is not honest in probing the nexus. The intent of the government is found lacking in probing the case,” he said.

The CSJP in a press note issued here recently on the International Anti-Drugs Day June 26 had also lambasted the state police machinery for abetting the drug trade in Goa.

“Goa has sunk into such a shameful situation that those entrusted with the duty of upholding justice by enforcing the law, blatantly availed of loopholes to acquit the accused,” Maverick said.

“Today citizens at large have lost their confidence in all arms of the authority and are led to believe that there definitely exists a nexus between the politicians, police and all rungs of traffickers,” he added.

The CSJP has also said that “bars and taverns are focal points of relaxation where soft drinks laced with narcotic substances and hard liquor flow freely and other psychotropic substances are easily available”.

Goa Home Minister Ravi Naik’s son Ro, has been linked by the Israeli media to the Israeli drug mafia operating in the state. Seven police officers have already been arrested for being a part of the drug nexus.

Leader of Opposition Manohar Parrikar had alleged in the Goa legislative assembly Tuesday that Kamat was shielding people linked to the drug trade.

The local media, which has been consistently reporting the drug nexus issue since it first came to the fore in March, has severely castigated the state police and the ruling political leadership for covering up the nexus.