India-Central Asia: The Need For Joint Counter-Narcotics Operations (2025)

India-Central Asia: The Need For Joint Counter-Narcotics Operations (2025)

Policy Update

Mallika Amale

Since the late 2010s, India has deepened strategic and economic ties with the five Central Asian Republics (CAR) of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan in a bid to assert itself as a key regional power. With India re-strategising and increasing diplomatic engagement with the resource-abundant CARs, bilateral trade has also flourished, primarily in uranium, crude oil, natural gas, and a range of other critical minerals.

Central Asia

The CARs are located strategically connecting Asia and Europe with various regional powers such as China, Russia, and Iran looking to increase their sphere of influence. For India, one of the main concerns is its proximity to the perpetual narcotics trafficking happening via the CARs, much of which primarily originates from Afghanistan. The border between Afghanistan and the Central Asian region is 2,387 km. Notably, India unfortunately lies between two huge infamous regions of illicit opium production namely, the Golden Crescent (Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran) and the Golden Triangle (Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar). Evidence shows that the former makes use of the CARs as a transit route to smuggle illegal drugs into European markets.

In recent years, this close proximity and porous borders have made India not only a transit route but also a destination for the opiates of Afghanistan. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), an estimated 2,000 tons of Afghan opiates may be consumed by countries on the Southern route, which includes Pakistan, Iran, and India. Massive drug seizures in India continue to remain at an all-time high, even though Afghanistan in August of 2021 officially banned poppy cultivation, which is the primary source of opium. Immediately after the ban, in September 2021, about 3,000 kg of heroin, which originated from Kandahar, had been seized at the Mundra port of Gujarat. This was the second largest drug bust in India. The largest ever seizure was made in February 2024 of about 3,330 kg of narcotics, including methamphetamine (a synthetic drug which is on the rise following a decline in supply of opium from Afghanistan). This consignment, believed to have originated from Iran’s Chabahar port, was intercepted at sea roughly 60 nautical miles off the coast of Gujarat.

Coordinated action against narcotics trafficking is of paramount importance for India’s national security and for broader regional stability in Asia. This is largely due to the transnational nature of narco-trafficking. There are many factors that are working against India but expanding ties with Central Asian countries will help mitigate the problem.

Functioning

Central Asian Republics and India work together and have modest legal and institutional initiatives to mitigate the problem of narcotics trafficking. These initiatives mainly comprises capacity-building measures, training assistance, and military and technical education. However, no specific cooperation or standalone policy exists on conducting joint narcotics operations with the CARs. The pivot in India’s strategy towards the Central Asian region can be broadly traced back to the launch of the Connect Central Asia policy of 2012.

In 2023, India hosted the first India-Central Asia Joint Working Group on Afghanistan, an initiative which was established following the inaugural India-Central Asia Summit. Although the main focus of this particular summit was to address the political and humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan following the takeover of Taliban, the issue of drug trafficking was discussed. India agreed to help relevant stakeholders in the CARs with capacity building. It also agreed to partner with UNODC to counter drug trafficking and help rehabilitate the Afghan drug-using population.

As mentioned before, India regularly works in tandem with the UNODC, SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation), and other such multilateral and bilateral initiatives to monitor and curb drug trafficking. The SCO established the Paris Pact Initiative in 2018 to expand mutual cooperation against drug trafficking in the region. Various MOUs exist between the SCO and UNODC exclusively as well such as the Central Asian Regional Information and Coordination Centre for Combating Illicit Trafficking in Narcotic Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and Their Precursors (CARICC); and the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO). Moreover, India has also begun establishing several country-specific initiatives with the CARs such as the India-Uzbekistan MoU on illicit trafficking (2018), intelligence sharing agreements with other countries, etc.

Performance

India, in the recent years has adopted a zero tolerance policy against drugs. This has led to a higher frequency of drug seizures by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) and all other law enforcement agencies across the country. In 2024, narcotics worth approximately INR 25,330 crore were seized. This rate is 55 percent higher compared to the INR 16,100 crore worth of drugs seized in 2023.

After the Afghanistan ban that led to a decrease in opium supply, synthetic drugs especially methamphetamines were on the rise globally. In India, high value and more harmful synthetic drugs including cocaine were seized increasingly. Methamphetamine supply increased from 34 quintals in 2023 to 80 quintals in 2024. Also, the quantity of cocaine seized has also gone up from 292 kgs in 2023 to 1426 kgs in 2024. Other precursors and pharmaceutical drugs were becoming prevalent as the quantity seized went up from 1.84 crore tablets to 4.69 crore tablets in 2024.

In October 2025, the third India-Central Asia meeting of the Secretaries of the Security Council and National Security Advisers convened in Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic. Among other outcomes, all parties agreed to enhance cooperation to prevent drug trafficking and reached a consensus on hosting regular meetings for the same. Thus highlighting the increasing intensity of efforts and institutionalisation between India and the CARs. Other matters including working towards expanding digital connectivity and infrastructure, AI and other emerging technologies, and space cooperation were discussed. Additionally, on the sidelines of this meeting, the NSA held bilateral meetings with Secretaries of Security Councils of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic and the Republic of Uzbekistan. 

Emerging Issues

Besides the fact that no specific framework on Joint Counter-Narcotics Operations exists between India and the CARs. The increasing institutional cooperation on counter-narcotics issues also has a number of emerging issues that are creating hurdles for the effective implementation of the cooperation framework. 

  • Lack of Transparent Data and Unreliable Data: There is no centralised monitoring system or availability of open access data that captures the scale of joint operations, seizures, prosecutions, and rehabilitation outcomes. This significantly constrains evidence-based assessment and inter-agency coordination, in general. Monitoring illicit drug-related financial flows is also challenging. Moreover, no credible data exists on global flow of drugs. Making an estimate as to actual production becomes difficult since data primarily relies on numbers highlighting seizures or arrests.
  • No Direct Connectivity and Border Issues: Other than the Chabahar port in Iran and other sea routes, India has no direct land access to Central Asia. Moreover, border disputes and other geopolitical dynamics with regards to Pakistan, China, and Afghanistan prevent real-time operational cooperation and make logistics extremely challenging. This also hinders surveillance of transit routes taken by traffickers.
  • Political Instability and Institutional Challenges: Most of the CARs are battling with terrorism and extremism. Evidence also suggests that weak governance and corruption in the states are hindering enforcement capabilities. This may undermine collective efficiency in potential joint operations.
  • Advancement in Trafficking Networks: Drug-trafficking organisations are known to quickly adapt to enforcement measures by switching to new synthetic drugs, digital platforms, and alternative transit routes. The dynamic nature of these networks surpass the level of current coordination frameworks.
  • No Uniform Legal or Regulatory Framework: Due to numerous factors such as varying national laws, extradition processes, and jurisdictions between stakeholders across India and the CARs result in difficulties with cross-border and transnational investigations and prosecution of narco-traffickers.
  • Geopolitical Concerns: The ongoing changes in the political situation of Afghanistan since the Taliban took over Kabul, coupled with broader regional tensions involving Russia, China, and other Western countries, considerably impact the nature of the counter-narcotics domain.

Way Forward

Moving forward, India and the Central Asian Republics need to foster tangible field-level coordination and evidence-based performance tracking. This includes laying out clear and defined joint operations and intelligence-backed interventions that are capable of intercepting trafficking networks in real time. Such operationalisation will show that this partnership is action-oriented.

In order for this to succeed, the focus should also be on establishing dedicated monitoring and evaluation mechanisms.The system should capture key indicators related to seizures, arrests, training conducted, rehabilitation outcomes, and alternate livelihood beneficiaries. Data transparency will enhance accountability and facilitate adaptive policy making. Moreover, it is important to strengthen border security and surveillance. Integrating counter-narcotics checkpoints and modern scanning technologies can help secure transit pathways that traffickers currently exploit.

Legal and institutional harmonisation between India and the Central Asian Republics should also be a priority. Developing mutual legal assistance treaties, uniform extradition frameworks, and shared evidence protocols will enhance prosecution success across jurisdictions.  There is a need for all stakeholders and authorities to evolve and advance rapidly as the narcotics networks are dynamic and able to adapt faster with emerging technological changes. With such measures, India-Central Asia counter-narcotics cooperation can become a resilient, data-driven pillar for security in the broader region.

References

About the Contributor

Mallika Amale is currently interning at IMPRI. She is pursuing a Master’s in International Relations and Strategic Studies from the School of International Relations and Strategic Studies (SIRSS) at the University of Mumbai. Her research interests include India’s foreign policy, maritime security in the Indian Ocean Region, and the Indo-Pacific.

Acknowledgement

The author sincerely thanks the team at IMPRI for their valuable guidance, as well as my peers for their support during the whole process.

Disclaimer

All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organisation.

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