Saptrishi Soni: For more than a decade, Punjab’s drug crisis has simmered under the surface, slowly morphing into a public catastrophe with roots penetrating deeply into the political corridors of power. Despite the shifting of governments between the Congress, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), and BJP alliances, the magnitude of the narcotics menace saw no substantial reversal. Instead, as current vigilance investigations begin to unearth old alliances and money trails, what emerges is a web of complicity, silence, and selective prosecution that has kept Punjab’s youth hostage to a thriving drug economy. As political leaders now trade fierce accusations, the state finds itself at the cusp of an uncomfortable reckoning with its own history.
The storm intensified when SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal held a press conference denying any links between his party or Bikram Singh Majithia with the ongoing drug trade allegations. Rejecting accusations of foreign money laundering, Badal challenged the current AAP-led Punjab government to present hard proof. He stated that his family and party have been unfairly targeted since Captain Amarinder Singh’s Congress regime and accused successive governments of orchestrating a conspiracy to dismantle SAD as a powerful regional force. According to Badal, the initial case during Amarinder Singh’s tenure alleged drug-linked assets worth ₹3,500 crore, based on claims made by then DGP Suresh Arora and senior officer Harpreet Sidhu. These were later legally discredited, with courts citing a lack of actionable evidence or any credible money trail against Majithia.
However, new developments are beginning to reframe the narrative. A confidential statement by former Enforcement Directorate Director Niranjan Singh to the Punjab Vigilance Bureau has reinvigorated the debate. Singh reportedly identified individuals including Jagjit Singh Chahal and Bittu Aulakh as active players in international drug syndicates with clientele in Canada. Crucially, he connected them to Bikram Singh Majithia through Paraminder Singh Pindi and Satpreet Singh Satta, pointing to shared security arrangements and financial exchanges as indicators of deeper ties. These revelations have cast a long shadow over Majithia’s denials, especially after it was revealed that Chahal had, according to Singh’s statement, settled a multi-crore dispute in Majithia’s favour as a political gesture, following a falling out over drug supply quality standards.
What adds further gravity to the evolving probe is the timeline of political inactivity. The Congress government under Captain Amarinder Singh had made sweeping declarations about eliminating the drug network within four weeks of assuming office in 2017. Yet, no significant crackdown followed. The Akali-BJP government that preceded it had presided over a period where drug abuse reached unprecedented levels in rural Punjab, but again, no major leaders were held accountable. Even the ED’s investigations under central BJP rule produced little prosecutorial momentum. Now, as the AAP government claims to be striking at the “kingpins” and not just street-level peddlers, a fresh round of political resistance is mounting from opposition parties who accuse the Mann administration of conducting a political witch hunt.
As public confidence wavers, what remains unmissable is the pattern of selective action, long delays in judicial processing, and an underlying political hesitance to address the root structures that have allowed this crisis to escalate. The recent arrest and remand of Bikram Singh Majithia have again divided opinion sharply between political vendetta and long-overdue accountability. Whether this is the moment that Punjab truly confronts its drug mafia—irrespective of political affiliations—or whether history will repeat itself in another electoral cycle of blame games, remains to be seen.
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