A Nigerian drug dealer is on the run after India police say they successfully extracted 106 cocaine capsules from a woman who was allegedly trying to smuggle the drugs into the country.
The 106 capsules weighing around 930 grams of pure South American cocaine were extracted from her body between May 14 and 20 by administering her laxatives at the Safdarjung Hospital.
The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) had arrested a 25-year-old Brazillian woman at the Indira Gandhi international (IGI) airport.
Vishwa Vijay, superintendent of NCB’s Delhi unit told the Hindustan Times newspaper that the woman was caught on May 14 soon after she landed at the Delhi airport in a flight from Sao Paulo in Brazil based on prior information.
The drugs are estimated to be worth 50 million rupees ($734, 160; £546,568).
Police believe the woman ingested the capsules in Sau Paulo, Brazil, and was given instructions to deliver them to a Nigerian national in Delhi.
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Officials from the narcotics department said that this was “the highest number of capsules of cocaine” that they had ever extracted from a person.
They added that what they have seized is high quality cocaine from Colombia, unlike the cheaper “crack” that is usually recovered in such cases.
Police are now on the lookout for the Nigerian national to whom she was supposed to deliver the drugs.
“The Nigerian national, who had to accept the consignment, was supposed to meet her in the hotel. The woman was promised USD 5,000 for successfully delivering the consignment of cocaine,” said a senior NCB official.
On Sunday, the woman was produced before a city court that sent her to Tihar jail.
The NCB official said the Brazilian woman is a ‘professional swallower of drugs’ and had visited India at least three times in the past.
