Nothing about the lane outside Medha School in Bowenpally suggests that it should be remembered for anything other than the daily school rush. Located on the north-western edge of Secunderabad, it is narrow, noisy and extremely ordinary. Auto rickshaws wait impatiently in the morning, vendors selling stationery and snacks hover near the gate and parents wait long enough to ensure that their children disappear safely inside the complex. The school building stands without drama, a functional concrete structure that blends seamlessly into a neighborhood shaped by small businesses, rental homes, and steady pedestrian traffic. Nothing about it suggests secrecy. And, investigators now believe, that was exactly the issue.
For about nine months, while classes 1 to 10 were being taught, parts of the same building were being used to manufacture Alprazolam, a psychoactive drug that is addictive far beyond the streets of Bowenpally. The facade finally collapsed on September 13 last year, when officials of Telangana’s Elite Action Group for Drug Law Enforcement (EAGLE) raided the premises and exposed a clandestine drug laboratory operating within the school.
Inside, police seized 3.4 kg of finished alprazolam, 4.3 kg of incomplete product and ₹21 lakh in cash. Investigators say the money represents just two days’ worth of sales. The accused was identified as Malela Jaya Prakash Gaur, 39, a resident of Old Bowenpally and director of Medha School. According to investigators, Gaur had been running the operation for months, deliberately using the school as a shield against investigation.
Authorities say the building was carefully divided to maintain the deception. There were classrooms in the basement, where children sat on benches and took lessons. There was a bank on the ground floor, adding another layer of legitimacy and stable public presence. Parts of the first floor were also used for teaching. However, the rear part of the structure remained under the exclusive control of Gaur. “This is where the drug lab was set up. The second floor, which earlier served as a gym, was locked and largely locked,” says an officer.
That physical separation, he says, ensured that the operation went on without raising alarms. “There are often restricted areas in schools. Closed rooms don’t raise questions. They used it to their advantage,” says the officer.
Across the street, a middle-aged shopkeeper who sells notebooks, pens and school bags is hunched over his counter, still struggling to process further. He’s been there for more than a decade and has watched a group of kids grow taller and farther. “We sometimes saw boxes going in and out,” he says, lowering his voice despite the constant noise on the road. “But every school has stuff – furniture, exam papers, computers. Who would think of drugs?”
He recalls delivery vehicles arriving at odd hours, sometimes late in the evening. “They weren’t secretive. That’s what fooled everyone. If someone is hiding something, they act nervous. Here, everything seemed normal. Very normal.”
A parent who lives two lanes away says the revelation upsets him so much that he has trouble expressing himself. Requesting anonymity, he says, “You leave your child at the gate and assume everything inside is controlled. Your worries are limited to studies. You don’t imagine chemicals and medicines.”
Investigators say Gaur supplied alprazolam to known contacts in Boothpur in Mahabubnagar district. He found that his background was far from education. He had earlier operated a toddy shop in Mahabubnagar and had paid ₹2 lakh to Guruva Reddy to obtain the manufacturing formula. The employees helped run the operation and police have identified several chemical suppliers linked to the racket.
As the scope of the investigation expanded, officials say they have identified 35 accused linked to the case and arrested seven so far. Many people have approached the courts for bail and anticipatory bail. Telangana’s Eagle Force is opposing these arguments citing the commercial scale involved.
Eagle-Telangana Director Sandeep Shandilya says, “Under Section 36A(4) of the NDPS Act, bail in such cases cannot be granted for a minimum of 180 days, which can be extended by another 180 days if the investigation continues. The case is still under investigation and more arrests are likely.”
For residents living around Medha School, the aftermath has been worrying, to say the least. The gate still opens every morning, but the conversation takes longer than before. Parents now look at the building differently. That familiarity, which was once reassuring, is now beginning to feel illusory.
In 2025, the Eagle Force, formerly the Telangana Anti-Narcotics Bureau, recorded its most aggressive year of enforcement since its inception, targeting both street-level supply chains and organized interstate and international drug networks. The operation extended to Telangana and several states, involving coordinated action with central agencies, police forces and financial intelligence units.
Across Telangana, 2,542 NDPS cases were registered till November 30 last year, involving 8,322 accused. Drugs worth ₹172.93 crore were seized, including consignments intercepted during inter-state operations and consignments handed over to agencies in Goa, Maharashtra, Delhi and Ranchi.
The average number of accused per case was just over three, indicating a shift toward dismantling distribution networks rather than making individual arrests.
An industrial belt offering deception
Just a few days later, in Cherlapalli, about 14 kilometers north of Bowenpalli, another discovery shocked local law enforcement. He realized that Hyderabad’s drug trade was not hidden in abandoned buildings or dark alleys; It was thriving in places that were designed to appear legitimate.
The Cherlapally industrial area stretches across the eastern edge of the city, wide and dusty, a dense patchwork of warehouses, chemical units and transport offices linked by narrow roads and routines. This is an area built on traffic. Tankers roaring by, carrying liquids, to name a few. Employees come and go at irregular times. The activity rarely stops long enough to attract attention.
Vagdevi Laboratories fits well into this scenario. From the outside, it looked no different from its neighboring units. Its walls were plain, its signage modest. Trucks kept coming in and out. The workers arrived carrying lunch boxes on their shoulders. By all external measures, it was a working chemical factory.
At a small stall a few meters away, a man of about 50 pours countless glasses of tea every day. He knows the rhythm of the field closely. “This place never sleeps,” he says, wiping his hands on a cloth. “Some factories work day and night. So when vehicles move at odd hours, no one notices.”
The shipment from Vagdevi Laboratories seemed routine, he says. “Tankers, cartons, chemicals…this is Cherlapally. This is normal.” What caught his attention for a while were cars. “You’ll see fancy cars coming fast and going fast; it’s not what you expect from a small unit. But still, you think maybe the owner is rich.”
Investigators allege that behind those walls operated a large-scale mephedrone manufacturing unit that had been running quietly for years. The matter came to light some distance away from Cherlapalli.
Bus Stop Bust for Global Supply Line
On August 8, about a month before the raid, Maharashtra Police had arrested 23-year-old Fatima Murad Shaikh alias Molla from Kashimira bus stop on Mira Road in Thane district. He was found with 178 grams of Mephedrone and ₹23.97 lakh in cash. During interrogation, he told the investigators that his source was based in Telangana.
That revelation set off a chain of events that brought the Mira Bhayandar-Vasai Virar Crime Branch to Hyderabad. The officers arrived quietly, put Vagdevi laboratories under surveillance and started tracking the patterns. When they raided the compound on 5 September, their suspicions were confirmed.
Inside the unit, police recovered about 5.8 kg of finished mephedrone, 35,500 liters of precursor chemicals, 950 kg of chemical powder and special manufacturing equipment. An officer involved in the investigation says that about 6,000 kg of mephedrone could be obtained from the precursor quantity alone. At an estimated international market price of ₹20,000 per gram, the value of potential production was approximately ₹12,000 crore.
The main accused, Srinivas Vijay Voleti, 34, owner of Vagdevi Laboratories Pvt Ltd, was detained along with Tanaji, a chemical analyst at the firm. During interrogation, Voleti allegedly admitted to manufacturing and selling mephedrone since 2020, supplying it to buyers in cities like Mumbai and Dubai and parts of Europe. Officials described him as tech-savvy and highly cautious, who avoided mainstream communications platforms and instead relied on lesser-known applications.
Laboratory analysis conducted in Mumbai confirmed the seized substance to be a scheduled chemical. The investigators say synthetic drug makers in southern India are increasingly shifting toward compounds like 3-chloromethcathinone (3CMC), underscoring how quickly these networks adapt to enforcement pressure. Agencies including the Narcotics Control Bureau, air cargo operators and international counterparts have been put on alert as police work towards tracking down the foreign buyers.
The Cherlapally investigation is also linked to the life and death of 51-year-old Azim Abu Salem Khan, a wanted history-sheeter in several narcotics cases. Khan was discovered in a flat in Pune’s Kondhwa area in October. When officers attempted to arrest him, he reportedly resisted, bit a constable and collapsed within minutes. He was declared dead on reaching the hospital. The subsequent autopsy pointed to head injuries and coronary atherosclerosis and the state CID took over the investigation as per protocol. Police said Khan was a drug addict for more than a decade and was a heart patient for several years.
Investigators allege that Khan was a key link in a large smuggling network that linked manufacturing units, couriers and money handlers. His name also cropped up in a parallel financial investigation. In November, during an operation in Goa, Eagle Force busted a Nigerian cartel, seized consignments worth ₹2.85 crore and unearthed a hawala network involving transactions worth ₹65 lakh. Raids in several states led to the arrest of 20 hawala operators and seizure of ₹3.08 crore. Police said the drug proceeds were sent abroad through the purchase of goods sent through cargo services.
At the end of the investigation, a senior officer explained the challenge clearly: “What makes such cases so difficult is that at first glance nothing appears criminal – a school, a factory, a business operating completely in public view. These are hidden fronts in plain sight, and that is what complicates enforcement. When everything seems routine, suspicion subsides, intelligence dries up and the drug trade gets breathing room. It takes time, patience, and often a little luck to crack down on such situations. By the time we see through the facade, the damage is already extensive.”
A sense of normality, officials say, is the most effective proxy of all. When drugs operate behind school bells and factory sirens, they become harder to detect and the consequences extend far beyond places that previously appeared untouched.
