Offices of alleged drug trafficking kingpin sealed

KOLKATA: The office of Sanjay Kedia, the alleged kingpin of an international internet drug trafficking racket, was on Wednesday sealed by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) for follow up investigations.

At least 10 officers of the NCB, backed by large number of police personnel, reached the office of Xponse Technologies, Xponse IT Services and Xponse Inc on Wednesday afternoon and asked the employees to vacate the premises spread over two floors of a multistoried building in Electronics Complex of the Salt Lake IT hub.

Nearly 350 odd employees of the three companies, owned by Kedia, initially put up a mild resistence to the move but later they walked out of the office allowing the NCB officers to conduct another round of search of the premises and then seal it.

A NCB official, who was part of the sealing process, said all the Xponse offices were sealed to facilitate the follow-up investigations.

"This is a major international drug racket and Xponse offices were sealed for follow-up search and investigations," the officer said.

A manager-level employee of Xponse was seen arguing with the NCB officials but later she gave in and walked out of the office. She, however, refused to respond to queries from media persons.

The NCB sleuths had, acting on a tip-off from Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) of the United States, first raided the Xponse premises on February 1 and later Kedia, an IIT Delhi alumni and CEO of Xponse, was arrested from his residence last Sunday.