Context: Recently, Delhi High Court asked the Centre to respond to a petition challenging the expansion of the definition of a drug under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

Key Issue

The petitioner challenged two notifications (2009 and 2011) under the NDPS Act stating that:

• The notifications were issued in excess of conferred authority.
• The notification has the power of creating a new category of offence by penalising the preparation of a drug on a par with the drug itself.
• There is a violation of Article 14 (equality before law) of the Constitution as there is no rational nexus between the classification created by these notifications and the object of the NDPS Act.
• It contended that the NDPS Act requires only the pure narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances to be considered for determining quantities.

Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 (NDPS Act)
NDPS Act is an act of the parliament to:

• consolidate and amend the law relating to narcotic drugs
• make stringent provisions for the control and regulation of operations relating to narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances.

The Narcotics Control Bureau was set up by the Central Government in 1986 to coordinate drug law enforcement nationally.
Key Features of the Act

• It prohibits a person from the production, cultivation, possession, sale, purchasing, transport, storage, and/or consumption of any narcotic drug or psychotropic substance.
• It provides for the implementation of the provisions of the International Conventions on Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substance.
• It defines terms like addict, drug, cannabis, board, controlled delivery, commercial quantity, corresponding law, conveyance, essential narcotic drug etc.

It empowers central government to:

•  add to or omit from the list of psychotropic substances.
•  take measures for preventing and combating abuse of and illicit traffic in narcotic drugs, etc.
• set up The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Consultative Committee.

It has provision for the prohibition of certain activities relating to property derived from offence.

• It penalises financing of certain illicit activities (such as cultivating cannabis or manufacturing narcotic drugs) or harbouring persons engaged in them.
• Persons found guilty of this offence will be punished with rigorous imprisonment of at least ten years (extendable up to 20 years) and a fine of at least one lakh rupees.