5,200 cannabis plants destroyed near Sunajhari, Keonjhar
On 10 January 2026 a joint forest, excise and police squad destroyed about 5,200 nearly mature cannabis plants at eight sites near Sunajhari village in Keonjhar's Banspal block. The divisional forest officer put the destroyed crop at about Rs 1.2 crore; no one was arrested.
The Times of India reported that on Saturday 10 January 2026 a joint enforcement squad raided
eight locations near Sunajhari village in the Kanjipani section of the Bhuyan Juanga range,
Banspal block, Keonjhar district, and destroyed about 5,200 nearly mature cannabis plants.[1]
Divisional forest officer Dhanraj H D told the paper the destroyed crop was worth about Rs 1.2
crore on local estimates and that roughly 70 forest, excise and police personnel took part.[1]The report said no one was arrested and that illegal cultivation had spread into
Keonjhar from neighbouring districts.[1]
The newspaper did not publish photographs of the eradication.[1]
Case data
Every number and detail the sources state, with the sources that state it.
Police in Udaipur district uprooted and seized 779.79 kg of green ganja plants grown illegally in the hills at Khara Kupiya, Mandwa. Three NDPS cases were registered at Mandwa police station against three residents and investigation began.
Police destroyed 467 cannabis plants growing in a villager's house compound at Binayipur in Nabarangpur district, Odisha, and arrested him. The Nabarangpur police registered a case under the NDPS Act, and a sub-divisional police officer gave the account of the raid to reporters.
Sepahijala superintendent of police Bijoy Debbarma said joint police, Tripura State Rifles and BSF teams destroyed at least 1.5 crore ganja plants in Sonamura subdivision over the past year, causing an estimated Rs 1,000 crore loss to the illegal trade. He said the crackdown lay behind a 2 November attack on a BSF team at Ashabari, after which police have arrested 21 people.
Koraput district police and excise teams destroyed 30,000 cannabis plants in joint raids, 12,000 of them at Atal Guda in the Boipariguda block and 18,000 in the Nandapur block, the district superintendent of police said. Koraput police said the Nandapur destruction covered about nine acres of hilly land near Kasandi and Dabuguda.
