More than Rs. 200 billion worth of narcotic drugs recovered in 2025/26: Minister

Colombo, June 24 (Daily Mirror) - In what seemed to be a shocking disclosure, narcotic drugs worth more than Rs. 200 billion have been recovered during the period from January 1, 2025 to April 30, 2026, Minister of Public Security Ananda Wijepala revealed in Parliament.

The Minister, who was responding to a question raised by MP Ravi Karunanayake, said drugs worth Rs. 154 billion have been recovered in 2025. Drugs worth Rs. 72.3 billion from January 1, 2026 to April 30, 2026.

Some 1571.3 kgs of Heroin, 14,714 kgs of Ganja, 37.9 kgs Cocaine, 699 kgs of Hashish, 2,741 kgs of ice, 615,000 narcotic capsules and three million tablets have been recovered in 2025. Some 1,189.7 kgs of Heroin, 3,184 kgs of Ganja, 261 kgs of cocaine, 1,260 kgs of Hashish, 779,460 narcotic capsules and 651,101 tablets have been recovered during the first four months of 2026.

Coming up with more shocking information, the Minister said there have been several instances of trafficking of received consignments of drugs which have been kept in courts as production items and samples handed over to the Government Analyst.  

“One instance has been reported from the Colombo Magistrate's courts when the officer in charge of production items has sold 750 gms of Heroin. A court case is pending over it,” he said.  

He said the second instance is the effort made by an officer at a government analyst to sell 250 gms of ice.

The Minister said the usual procedure followed is keeping of recovered drugs in court houses as production items. These are kept in well locked vaults until the cases are completed. The keys of the vaults are kept with the officers in charge of production items. It was revealed that there are a total of 80,000 kgs of various narcotic drugs that are to be destroyed.

Furthermore, the government has spent a total of Rs. 780 million to reward the police officers and other whistleblowers who have played a role in recovery of drugs.