Chandigarh:
Recent attacks on anti-drug vigilantes and activists, besides the cops, have shone a spotlight on the loopholes in the AAP government’s high-decibel ‘Yudh Nasheyan Virudh’ campaign. Those raising their voice against the free flow of drugs are not only being silenced by the deep-rooted drug mafia but also allegedly by the state police officials. This has cast a shadow over the government’s much-publicised war on drugs.
The latest incident, which questions the widespread corruption in the state’s health and police departments and has shell-shocked the entire state, has been reported in Mansa. Drug addict turned anti-drug activist Parvinder Singh Jhota was shot dead in broad daylight not by the drug peddler of the mafia but by a pharmacy shop owner who was openly selling drugs.
He is not the only pharmacist found selling illegal drugs; dozens of others were arrested on similar charges in the past. The infamous Neha Shoree murder by a Mohali pharmacist in 2029 is still fresh as the family continues to fight the same in court.
Parvinder Singh Jhota, just moments before he was killed, had gone live on social media, confronting the accused pharmacist over the alleged open sale of banned synthetic drugs.
What followed was not just a heated argument, but a brutal execution. Bullets tore through him, leaving him dead on the floor and injuring four others.
The victim Jhota was keeping an eye on the pharmacist and had paraded him publicly with a shoe garland in 2023 when he was found selling banned drugs. Surprisingly, it wasn’t local police or the health department officials but an activist who got an FIR registered against the accused. Punjab Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema, himself accused of silencing another activist, Gulzar, in his own constituency, condemned the incident but said it was ‘personal rivalry’ that led to the incident.
Regarding the continuously increasing drug-related cases in Mansa, the IG of the Bathinda Range held a press conference and said that whenever any information related to drugs comes to the attention of his department, action is taken by them. He said that as far as allopathic drugs are concerned, the police also have certain limitations, and some other departments are involved as well. Joint action by all departments is taken in such cases, and several actions are already underway in this regard. A special programme related to drugs is being organised on the 16th, in which all officers, both senior and junior, will participate.
Speaking about the murder case of Parvinder Singh Jhote, the IG said that wherever the police receive accurate information, action is taken by the police at that location.
He also said that whenever Parvinder Singh Jhote has raised such issues related to drugs, the police have also taken action.
Responding to questions raised by journalists about the current SHO, the IG said, “I have no information about this. I am holding this press conference only to address this matter and discuss what kind of action should be taken in this case.”
Public Outrage
The Mansa incident has sparked unprecedented anger among the common people, tearing the mask off the state’s tall claims and exposing a growing, deep mistrust for the government. Public fury reached a boiling point on the streets, where angry citizens were seen tearing off Bhagwant Mann posters and hoardings in outrage. The public sentiment is clear: how could a habitual offender with a history of peddling retain an active licence if the system wasn’t shielding him?
This tragic execution has cast massive aspersions against the state government’s much-touted anti-drug campaign, ‘Yudh Nasheyan Virudh’. The campaign faces questions when the state fails to protect the very vigilantes and anti-drug activists who do the groundwork that the administration avoids.
As families mourn, hospitals overflow with protesters, and streets echo with slogans demanding the immediate dismissal of the administration, civil society groups are asking hard questions. Parvinder Singh Jhota is gone, but his death has unmasked the raw, bleeding reality of Punjab’s underground economy – where peddlers carry guns, activists walk into execution chambers, and justice remains a distant dream.
Corrupt Health Departments, And Systemic Failure
To understand the gravity of Jhota’s murder, we have to look back at the bitter history that preceded it and the unholy nexus operating right under the administration’s nose. Back in July 2023, Parwinder Singh Jhota had caught the very same accused pharmacist, Ashwani Kumar, red-handed, allegedly selling banned medical capsules. Taking matters into his own hands out of sheer frustration with local peddling and corrupt health department officials who are hand in glove with such pharmacists, Jhota had famously paraded Ashwani through the market with a garland of shoes.
While that incident landed Ashwani in legal trouble, it also earned Jhota a counter-case for taking the law into his own hands. For years, Jhota lived under constant threat. Yet, when he walked into that pharmacist’s shop looking for accountability, he walked straight into an ambush executed by a notorious offender whose drug licence was never even cancelled despite repeated illegal activities.
This is not an isolated tragedy. Remember the chilling murder of FDA officer Neha Shoree, who was shot dead inside her office back in 2019 by a pharmacist whose licence she had cancelled? When whistleblowers and anti-drug activists try to fill the vacuum left by enforcement agencies, they are systematically targeted, threatened, and eliminated in broad daylight.
In multiple rural belts across districts like Tarn Taran, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, and Kapurthala, local youth clubs and voluntary village committees formed to monitor or stop drug peddling have faced direct intimidation, armed threats, and physical assaults from local syndicates when attempting to report or intercept peddlers.
Sukhjit Singh, a local grassroots anti-drug leader and social activist who openly challenged local drug peddling networks, was brutally attacked and hacked to death in Dec 2024 by a mob using sharp-edged weapons.
Independent social auditors and whistleblowers exposing illegal pharmaceutical distribution (such as unauthorised sales of habit-forming pills by rogue medical stores) frequently report threats to life, vandalism of property, and physical ambushes, reflecting the severe hostility confronting independent actors working outside official enforcement channels.
The Parallel War: Targeted Cop Killings
The terror unleashed by the drug cartels isn’t just restricted to civilian activists – it has directly penetrated the state’s armed shield. In a chilling pattern that has created an atmosphere of deep fear and demoralisation within the police force, over half a dozen cops and home guards have been shot dead in recent months by criminal syndicates tied to drug networks.
The escalating terror unleashed by criminal syndicates and drug networks in Punjab’s border districts has claimed the lives of multiple law enforcement personnel in targeted attacks, beginning with the fatal shooting of Assistant Sub-Inspector Gurnam Singh and Home Guard Ashok Kumar on February 22, 2026, at the Adhian police outpost in Gurdaspur. This grim pattern continued when Assistant Sub-Inspector Harjit Singh was gunned down by motorcycle-borne assailants on September 17, 2026, while on duty in Amritsar, followed closely by the assassination of Assistant Sub-Inspector Iqbal Singh on October 11, 2026, in Tarn Taran while he was returning home after paying obeisance at a gurdwara.
Intelligence Reports And Security Audits Reveal A Sinister Nexus
Local drug lords and criminal syndicates are deploying hardened criminals and addicts as hitmen. These shooters track down and ambush enforcement officials and police personnel with impunity. When a state’s police force faces targeted assassinations and anti-drug activists are gunned down inside local stores without fear of law, it sends a terrifying signal to the entire system.
