Ephedrine bust: 1 more held, takes total arrests to 11

Thane: Police have arrested one more person in connection with the multi-crore Ephedrine drug haul case, taking total number of arrests so far to eleven.

Sushil Asikannan, who has been on run since April when Thane police raided Avon Lifesciences in Solapur and seized around 18.5 tonne of ephedrine worth Rs 2000 crore, was arrested from Bengaluru yesterday.

Asikannan has been staying in Bengaluru disguising himself as a defence personnel, police said.

He was produced before a court here, which remanded him in police custody until August 31 after rejecting his pre-arrest bail.

Besides the 11 arrested, the police have named alleged druglord Vicky Goswami and former Bollywood starlet Mamta Kulkarni as wanted accused in the case.

Among the arrested persons so far are a director and an operations manager of the Solapur-based firm.

Asikannan is suspected to have played role in transportation of ephedrine from Solapur unit of the factory to Mumbai and other parts of country and even overseas.

As per police, ephedrine was being diverted from Avon Lifesciences to a Kenya-based drug cartel headed by Goswami where it was to be used to make party drug meth.