Six years ago, Sreejith PS, a resident of Kumarakom won a lottery ticket that fetched him Rs 70 lakhs. On Monday, the special squad of Excise Department Kottayam, who had been tailing him for the past six months, caught him selling small packets of ganja.
He was picked up by the Excise personnel who approached him in the guise of buyers. Sreejith who had evaded the Excise Department for almost a year fell for the bait. It was during the questioning that Sreejith told the officials about winning the lottery ticket.
Excise Circle Inspector Sreeraj P who led the team said that his name kept popping up whenever they arrested small-time ganja vendors. “This name was a common factor in all the recent arrests we made. He was on our radar for a while and we kept tailing him. A year ago we raided his house but we couldn't find any stuff,” said Sreeraj.
During questioning, Sreejith told the officials that he had around Rs 30 lakhs as fixed deposit; savings left from his lottery prize money.
Of late, sale of ganja in and around Kumarakom especially among school and college students was on the rise and the Excise team intensified the surveilance. Sreejith was found to be procuring ganja in small-scale quantities from wholesale dealers. “He sold it in small packets at a rate of Rs 500 for 5 gm or 50 gm for Rs 2500,” said Sreeraj. He was let off on bail on Tuesday.
Assistant Excise Inspector Binod K R, Preventive Officers Baijumon K C, Rajesh S, Niphy Jacob, Aromal Mohan, civil excise officers Pradeep M G and Aju Joseph and Excise driver Anil Kumar K were part of the team that arrested Sreejith.
