Can India descriminalise personal drug consumption?

A more progressive, humane and modern approach to tackling the drugs menace is arriving. An update.

 Can India descriminalise personal drug consumption?

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• The story: The Cental government is working to decriminalise personal consumption of small quantities of drugs, narcotics and psychotropic substances. The move is anchored by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.
• Progress: Major departments seem to have agreed to do away with imprisonment and fines for personal consumption of drugs by Indians. That will require amending Section 27 of the Narcotic, Drugs & Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985, (NDPSA) among other clauses, especially for first-time offence. Rehabilitation and deaddiction programmes of 30 days may be introduced to wean away drug users.
• The law as it is: Section 27 of the NDPSA makes drug consumption a punishable offence that can attract a fine of Rs 10,000 and imprisonment of six months or both. 

1. Bail provisions are also quite stringent under the Act. 
2. Officials from the Department of Revenue, the nodal ministry for the Act, Ministry of Home Affairs, the Narcotics Control Bureau and the Ministry of Health, among others, agreed with the suggestions of the Department of Social Justice & Empowerment on the same.

• See them as victims not culprits: The social justice department wants drug users seen as 'victims' rather than 'culprits' of the issue of substance abuse and be sent to rehabilitation and deaddiction programmes, instead of penalties and prison terms. The finer details of the 'decriminalisation' approach are likely to be finalised soon. A new amendment bill will arrive in the Parliament for that.
• Consensus important: This could eventually move India's drug law from a purely criminal justice based system to a rehabilitation and treatment centric one. That would be progressive indeed. Prior to the 1985 Act, India had no law against consumption of drugs. India witnessed a raging debate over criminalisation of drug consumption, sparked by the Aryan Khan and Rhea Chakraborty arrests.
• What is in the offing: The amendments planned are to 'rationalise the sentence structure to ensure that while traffickers of significant quantities of drugs are punished with deterrent sentences, the addicts and those who commit less serious offences are sent rehabilitation or sentenced to less severe punishment'. 

1. The strict bail provisions may be considered for those offenders who indulge in repeat offences. Digitisation of drug seizure data should be facilitated pan India through amendments to the Act. Use of technology for destruction of illegal cultivation of narcotic crops was also proposed.
2. A fund may be set up for control of drug cultivation and to wean away farmers from illegal cultivation and special programmes in schools and colleges for deaddiction. This refers to Section 7A of the NDPS Act, 1985. 

• Other issues involved: To prescribe maximum admissible quantity of main psychotropic substances in case of cannabis for medicinal purposes, to empower enforcement agencies by treating its enquiry as a ‘judicial proceeding’ under section 193 and 228 of the IPC, to amend Section 32B to allow for higher than minimum punishment if an offender is involved in trafficking of more than one substance, and increase fine and penalty for ‘vexatious entry’ or conspiracy to falsely implicate and search a person under the provisions of the Act.
• EXAM QUESTIONS: (1) Explain the role of sensitivity in managing drug abuse cases. (2) What are the various ways the government of India can try and minimise drug abuse? Would hard measures alway work? Explain the new, progressive approach.

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