Chandigarh: The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has frozen 25 assets valued at about Rs 20.10 crore in its interstate pharmaceutical drug-diversion case, the agency said in a statement reported by Daily Kiran on Sunday. The freezing order, first issued on October 2 under Section 68F(2) of the NDPS Act, was confirmed by the competent authority in New Delhi on October 30. Freezing under this provision bars any sale, transfer or transaction in the properties; it is an investigative step, not a conviction or a final confiscation.

The frozen assets include industrial plots, commercial units, shop-office units and residential flats, with named locations in Mohali including Gilco Industrial Park, Mohali City Center-3, Mohali City Center Walk, Janata Industrial Estate, Galaxy Heights-2 and Queenstown, the NCB said. The agency alleged that the proceeds of illegally sold diverted drugs were funnelled through various company bank accounts to legitimise the funds, and that the accused could not provide valid sources of income for the purchases — its allegation, not a court finding.

The case began on February 7, 2025, when 5,000 tramadol tablets were seized in Amritsar, the NCB said. The packaging named M/s J.R. Pharmaceuticals of Haridwar as manufacturer and M/s Tiwari Medical Agencies of Dehradun as marketer; the NCB says the marketing company did not exist. Its Special Investigation Team says it then traced an interstate network in which pharmaceutical companies in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh allegedly distributed drugs through fictitious entities. The court record independently confirms this spine of the case: the Punjab and Haryana High Court's judgment in a connected petition records the same February 7, 2025 seizure — 5,000 tramadol tablets from Aashu alias Ashu Arora at Jandiala Guru, Amritsar — and the NCB's allegation that M/s Digital Vision of Kala Amb supplied tramadol capsules and codeine cough syrup to firms that did not exist, with Rs 32,44,360 in unexplained cash recovered from the residence of its partner Manic Goyal.

To date, the NCB says, about 3.4 million psychotropic tablets, 1.057 million bottles of codeine-based cough syrup, 50,000 tramadol ampoules, 5,000 midazolam vials and nearly 2,200 kg of psychotropic powder have been seized in the case, and 17 people have been arrested across seven states — Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Haryana, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh. Significant quantities were recovered from M/s Digital Vision and M/s Velinton Healthcare in Kala Amb, Himachal Pradesh, the agency said.

The NCB named Konik Goyal, Manik Goyal and their father Parshottam Lal Goyal, residents of Ambala Cantt in Haryana, as fugitives who have not appeared despite summons and non-bailable warrants, and said their anticipatory bail applications were rejected by the Supreme Court; the frozen assets include properties in their names and in relatives' names, according to the agency. Those characterisations are the NCB's; the men have not been convicted.

The case is also being fought in court on procedure. In April 2026, Justice Sumeet Goel of the Punjab and Haryana High Court held, in the petition of Digital Vision partner Anuj Kumar Singh, that the NCB had held him in coercive custody from the night of October 31, 2025 — long before his formal arrest was recorded at 9 p.m. on November 1, 2025 — and that his detention beyond 24 hours without production before a magistrate was illegal, ordering his release. The ruling does not decide the diversion allegations themselves, but it is a judicial rebuke of the agency's arrest practice in this very investigation, reported by SCC Online from the court order and by LawStreet.

The NCB said its strategy is to attack trafficking networks financially as well as through seizures, with parallel probes into manufacturers, distributors, shell companies and financial facilitators, and it urged the public to report drug trafficking to the National Narcotics Helpline, 1933.

What happens next: whether the frozen-asset action survives further challenge before the competent authority and the courts, and whether the named fugitives are arrested — the two points on which this case will now be tested.