On Environment Day, youths in Kollam planted cannabis saplings.

KOLLAM: On World Environment Day, when everyone was busy planting saplings to commemorate the occasion, a few people in Kollam took advantage of the opportunity to plant ganja saplings along the roadside. On Monday, the Kollam excise team recovered two cannabis saplings from the side of a road in Kandachira. The saplings were planted to commemorate World Environment Day. The excise team is looking for the young people who were involved.

The saplings, which were 60cm and 30cm tall, were discovered planted along the road between Kurishadi junction in Kandachira and the bypass. The saplings were discovered on the roadside by a team led by excise special squad sub-inspector T Rajeev.

On World Environment Day morning, an eyewitness informed the department’s special squad CI I Noushad that a few people came and planted these saplings there, and when confronted, they defended themselves by saying they loved this plant. The witness also informed the excise squad that a ganja addict had led a group of young people in the planting of cannabis. The men who planted the saplings told locals that they should let the plants grow so that they could take selfies next to them, he said.

The team received a similar tip about the ganja plants seen beneath the Mangad bypass bridge. However, nothing was recovered from the site when the team arrived for an inspection. However, the excise officer stated that there were indications that cannabis was grown there previously. The officer went on to say that they had received information that the plants were owned by a Kandachira resident who had been involved in several ganja cases.

According to Assistant Excise Commissioner B Suresh, the team is on the hunt for the perpetrators, who will be apprehended soon. “It appears that certain gangs are experimenting with new methods because they are unable to travel to other places to smuggle in the stuff due to the lockdown,” he said.