Two college students were killed in Mumbai, with one of them still in critical condition after taking the popular drug ecstasy at a concert on Saturday. As reported by HT, the police arrested the peddler who supplied the three students with drugs.
The peddler, identified as Anand Patel, was produced before the court on Tuesday, where he was remanded in police custody till April 16. The accident occurred during a concert at the NESCO Exhibition Center in Goregaon.
What happened to the students?
Shreya Rai, 24, and Sheetal Salvi, 25, along with other classmates from Jamnal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS), attended the 999999999 concert at the NESCO ground on Saturday.
Ray and Salvi, who were in the crowd, had difficulty breathing and later collapsed due to dizziness, after which another friend of theirs took the two women to the hospital.
Along with them, a third person – Bismat Singh Amarjit Singh Bhasin, 28 – attended the same show and complained of dizziness and cramps in the extremities.
Rai and Bhasin were admitted to hospitals but died during treatment. Meanwhile, Salvi is still in the ICU.
Drugs delivered by Porter, 6 people were arrested
In her statement to the police, Salvi stated that she and Rai took a yellow pill given to them by another friend of theirs – Raunak Khandelwal. She later explained to the cops that the pill she took was actually ecstasy.
The police arrested Khandelwal, during interrogation the name of the drug peddler was revealed. It was also revealed that the pills were being provided to the students through the Porter app.
Six people were arrested. These include –
- Anand Patel – drug peddler
- Balkrishna Kurup, 46, vice president of NESCO Exhibition Centre
- Sunny Vinod Jain, 31, works with Kurup
- Akash Panmari Samal, 31, is an employee of Nagpur-based production company Inspiring Tie Production, which organized the party
- Ronak Rahul Khandelwal, 25, college student
- Pratik Bigesh Pandey, 24, college student
Besides supplying drugs to university students, the festival organizers also ran into trouble after police announced not only that they had failed to check drugs but also for not having the proper alcohol licence.
In the remand application seen by HT, the police also stated that “despite being fully aware of the prohibition under the Prohibition of Liquor Act against serving alcohol to individuals under the age of 25, the organizers served alcohol to the deceased and others, even though none of them had a valid liquor permit.”
