'Operation Toofan's Duplicity Exposed, Home Minister Hides Behind False Narratives': Pinarayi Vijayan

Thiruvananthapuram: Opposition Leader Pinarayi Vijayan has accused the Home Department and Minister Ramesh Chennithala of “running away” by making baseless allegations against the previous government after the alleged duplicity of Operation Toofan came to light. Pinarayi said the Opposition had never opposed Operation Toofan, the anti-drug crackdown, and had extended its full support to it. However, he alleged that after the Opposition questioned high-level attempts to derail an international MDMA case in which the Chief Minister’s social media coordinator was an accused, efforts were made to halt scientific evidence collection in the Kasaragod case. In a Facebook post, he said the authorities had also refused to produce the phones seized from the accused before the court or take them to Bengaluru for evidence collection.

After the duplicity of Operation Toofan came to light, the Home Minister had claimed that the LDF government, despite being in power for 10 years, had failed to seize even 500 grams of MDMA. Pinarayi Vijayan responded by detailing the anti-drug operations carried out during the previous government. In July 2024, Kerala Police, while tracing the source of 2.4 kg of MDMA seized in Thrissur, identified and shut down an international drug manufacturing laboratory allegedly run by a film producer in Hyderabad. Chemicals were also seized with the assistance of forensic experts. He said Kerala Police accomplished in Telangana what the state government led by Revanth Reddy had failed to do. He added that the Home Minister could have understood the scale of the LDF government’s anti-drug operations had he at least asked Revanth Reddy, the Telangana Chief Minister and a Congress leader.

Central government records submitted in Parliament themselves show that the LDF government’s anti-drug efforts were exemplary, Pinarayi said. According to a reply given by the Union Finance Minister in the Lok Sabha on February 3, 2025, Keralam had taken the strongest action against drugs since 2022. The number of arrests in drug-related cases in Keralam was three times that of the state with the second-highest number of arrests.

Although Keralam has a relatively low level of drug use, these figures demonstrate that the state’s efforts to prevent drug trafficking have set an example for the country, he said. According to a reply given by the Central government in the Rajya Sabha on December 22, 2022, Keralam’s conviction rate in NDPS cases was more than 98 per cent. This was significantly higher than the national average of 78 per cent. Telangana’s conviction rate stood at only 25 per cent.

From 2021 to 2025, the Kerala Police registered 1,26,855 NDPS cases. He attributed the 538 per cent increase in case registrations to strict surveillance and strong interventions such as Operation D-Hunt. According to a reply given by Excise Minister M Liju to MLA U R Pradeep’s question on June 23, 2026, the Excise Department registered 41,946 NDPS cases and 4,18,403 COTPA cases in Keralam over the past five years.

The same reply stated that the Excise Department had seized 17,587.4335 kg of cannabis, 33,419.996 grams of MDMA, 65,943.8254 grams of hashish and 1,60,597.093 kg of COTPA products during the five-year period.

Pinarayi Vijayan also cited the Kerala Excise Department’s seizure of 80 kg of MDMA from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in 2023, the seizure of 5 kg of MDMA in Kochi in 2018, and major drug seizures carried out during 2022-2025, including Operation D-Hunt, as evidence of the LDF government’s strong interventions against narcotics.

He said these achievements, which he described as exemplary, are now being criticised in a “cheap” manner by the current Home Minister.