Vijayawada outskirts becoming ganja adda for youth

Vijayawada: Thousands of youth living in the colonies located on the outskirts of Vijayawada are habituated to ganja consumption and other vices. Due to lack of proper police vigil, youth in groups taking ganja at public places and creating problems to local residents.

Hundreds of youth in Vambay Colony, Kandrika, Rajiv Nagar, YSR Colony, New RR Pet, Ajit Singh Nagar, Rama Rajya Nagar, HB Colony, Bhavanipuram, Urmila Nagar and other areas are habituated to ganja consumption and spoiling their health and future. Most of them belong to poor and below middleclass families. The parents are unable to check ganja habit of their children. Liquor consumption too has become regular activity among the youth.

Vijayawada is a commercial city and there is no industrial development. Due to lack of proper education and facilities like skill development centres, youth are not getting employment opportunities and getting addicted to ganja. Parents and local residents suggested the government to establish skill development and training centres for the youth so that they can get training and start their own works.

Most of the residents in these areas depend on construction works, loading and unloading works, transport sector, automobile sector, doing petty jobs in shops, wholesale and retail.

Job opportunities are decreasing in these sectors due to Covid impact, which also drastically effected trading activity since last year. All these factors created unemployment, thus leading to bad habits among the youth.

Vijayawada city police along with psychologists conducting awareness programmes among youth to stop bad habits and explaining the ill effects of taking ganja. But it is not enough to motivate them to stop consuming ganja. Unless and until some livelihood source is not provided, the lives of youth cannot be changed.

The State government is conducting various programmes for skill development among youth. These programmes should be conducted in colonies located on the outskirts of cities so that the local youth can attend the training classes and eke out livelihood.

Krishna District Collector J Nivas is planning to construct skill development and training centres near Jagananna Colonies to help local youth to get training that will provide livelihood. These centres should be arranged in backward colonies and slums in cities like Vijayawada too to help local youth to get training in some professions. Locals and parents suggested that collective efforts should be made by Vijayawada Municipal Corporation, district administration, NGOs and others to set up training centres or skill development centres.

Since located in the heart of Andhra Pradesh, Vijayawada city has many ways to get ganja. Several gangs are involved in ganja peddling. Ganja and other drugs are transported from Agency areas of East Godavari and Visakhapatnam to other parts of South India, particularly to Telangana and Tamil Nadu. Vijayawada city police and Krishna district police have caught many ganja peddlers and seized ganja and other drugs in recent years.

But ganja menace persists due to lack of continuous vigil in the colony and involvement of traders and peddlers. Stepping up vigil and taking help of local people, police can check ganja supplies to these colonies and save youth from ganja menace.