India, July 12 -- Synthetic narcotics and pharmaceutical abuse redefine North India's expanding interstate drug trafficking networks today.

For years, North India's narcotics crisis had a single, devastating epicentre. Mention chitta-the street name for the semi-synthetic heroin that hollowed out an entire generation-and the mind immediately travelled to Punjab's border villages, where addiction reshaped families and emptied homes of hope.

But that map is changing.

A new and far more complex narcotics network is spreading across Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. What was once viewed largely as a cross-border smuggling problem has evolved into an interstate criminal ecosystem powered by synthetic drugs, diverted pharmaceutical opioi...