MUMBAI: An interstate mephedrone (MD) manufacturing and trafficking network spanning Maharashtra, Gujarat, Telangana and Tamil Nadu has been busted. The police have arrested 18 persons and seized narcotics, precursor chemicals and equipment worth over ₹50 crore.MD-making unit busted, 18 arrestedThe breakthrough came after the arrest of a couple from Naya Nagar in Mira Road for allegedly peddling drugs. Their interrogation led investigators to a larger network involved in the production and distribution of MD across multiple states.Sandeep Doifode, deputy commissioner of police (crime branch, MBVV), said the arrests of peddlers from Byculla and Mira Road helped police trace a manufacturing and storage facility in Malwani. There, officers arrested a local resident and his associates and seized 255 litres of chemicals used in the production of MD, including sodium hydroxide pellets, hydrochloric acid, acetone, dichloromethane, methylamine and chloroform.Police also recovered laboratory equipment such as a heating dryer, separation flask, heating mantle, recovery flask, four-finger clamp, addition pot and Buchner funnel. The seized material was valued at ₹13.65 crore.Further investigation led police to Sandeep Viraswamy Naidu, who was arrested in Khalapur, Raigad district, on May 28. His interrogation led to the arrest of Nasir alias Baba Janimiya Shaikh and Mehmood Mehboob Khan in Hyderabad a day later.The two allegedly revealed the location of a clandestine MD manufacturing unit operating from Pichargadi Tanda in Telangana’s Zaheerabad tehsil.According to police, Nasir, a resident of Sangareddy district, had established the unit on a two-acre farmhouse property. Acting on the information, an MBVV police team raided the premises and seized 3kg of MD.Officers also recovered 2,293 litres of precursor chemicals, including chloroform, acetone, monomethylamine, hydrochloric acid and 2-Bromo, a substance regulated under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. Laboratory equipment used to manufacture the drug was also seized. The total value of the contraband and materials recovered from the Telangana unit was estimated at ₹16.22 crore.Doifode said Nasir was arrested in Telangana in 2014 and came into contact with other inmates involved in the narcotics trade while in jail. Through those contacts, he allegedly obtained links to Chinese suppliers from whom he sourced chemicals required for manufacturing MD.According to investigators, Nasir created forged documents portraying himself as the owner of a chemical manufacturing company and used them to import precursor chemicals through courier services.“We have found that apart from Maharashtra, Nasir had also supplied MD and precursor chemicals to Tamil Nadu, where another manufacturing unit was recently raided,” Doifode said.