Amit Shah Sets 2029 Deadline for Drug-Free India at Anti-Narcotics Conference

Union Home Minister Amit Shah has fixed December 31, 2029, as the deadline for eliminating India's narcotics trade, telling police chiefs from 36 states and Union Territories that the country cannot afford to let a single gram of drugs cross its borders in either direction.

Speaking at the third National Conference of Anti-Narcotics Task Force Heads in New Delhi, Shah said, "Neither will we allow a single gram of drugs to enter India, nor will we allow a single gram of drugs to go out." The conference also saw the launch of new television commercials warning against drug use, a redesigned website for the Narcotics Control Bureau, and the laying of foundation stones for zonal NCB complexes in Lucknow and Dehradun.

From seizures to dismantled networks

Shah's core instruction to the states was a shift in how success is measured. Seizure figures, he indicated, should not be treated as victories in themselves, since a headline-grabbing haul does not necessarily destroy the network behind it. The directive to every state is to move from meetings to missions, from reports to results, from seizures to dismantled networks, and from cases to convictions.

Districts have been made the frontline unit of this effort. Each district is being classified according to its role in the drug chain — whether it is a production or entry point, a transit corridor, or a consumption zone — so that responses can be tailored accordingly. Investigators have also been asked to pursue financial trails with the same intensity as the narcotics themselves, tracking bank accounts and shell transactions that keep trafficking operations running.

Appeal to officers

Shah urged the assembled police chiefs to treat the fight as a personal mission rather than a routine duty. He asked them to meet a mother whose son once ranked among the top 10 in his Class 10 board examinations and who has since been consumed by addiction, suggesting that such encounters would drive home the human cost of the crisis. He linked the campaign to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of a developed India by 2047, noting that the country's young population cannot fulfil that goal if it is being hollowed out by narcotics.

Vision Document and Nashamukt Mitra

The government's roadmap, the Vision Document 2026-2029, rests on four pillars: enforcement and intelligence, control of precursor chemicals and synthetic drugs, demand and harm reduction, and system-wide capacity building. Officials said it contains more than 100 individual targets.

A major component is the Nashamukt Mitra programme, which has registered nearly 47,000 volunteers against a target of 1 lakh. Over the coming months, these volunteers will visit around 10 lakh schools and colleges to speak directly with students and brief campus staff.

Shah also flagged emerging threats, including synthetic drugs, dark web marketplaces, cryptocurrency payments, and dead-drop deliveries, and asked states to build specialised teams that do not operate like conventional police units.

On foreign nationals involved in drug supply chains, his position was unambiguous: deport them and blacklist them. For those running supply operations into India from abroad, the objective is extradition to face Indian courts.