When kids do drugs... ...tune in, but don’t drop out
As parents grapple with drug abuse by their children, they can’t help but take on a vigilante role. Somendra Sharma & Yogesh Pawar explore the contours of what parenting looks like when drugs come easy
A Bandra resident who works in a private firm in South Mumbai in a senior position was concerned for her 19-year-old. He’d get upset over trivialities and start shouting. With her husband away at work in Dubai and her elder son in the US to pursue higher studies, she decided to find out what was bothering her college-going son.
One day she snooped into his cellphone while he was in the bath. What she found shocked her. On a WhatsApp group, members were discussing prices, sellers and pick-up points for weed. Concerned, she sifted through more of her son’s stuff over the next two-three days and found a narcotic substance in his wallet. When the teen found out, he threw a fit, angry that his mother had gone through his stuff.
Helpless, the woman approached Shivdeep Lande, Deputy Commissioner of Police of Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC), Mumbai Police. “She showed me the small polythene packet from her son’s wallet which I identified as charas [hash],” he said. “She wanted to take him to a counsellor. But I told her pressure wouldn’t work as much as talking to him. Soon, she began talking to him about his life, challenges and anxieties. I and my team also spent time counselling him,” said Lande.
The efforts bore fruit over the following months. The mother recently called Lande to tell him that her son was now totally clean.
Capital concern
In Delhi’s tony Safdarjung Enclave, a Marwadi entrepreneur and his wife were puzzled over the disappearance of cash and bits of jewellery from their home from time to time.
Concerned, they questioned the house help. They began ensuring nobody accessed the bedrooms when the family was not around. But money and trinkets continued to vanish.
“My husband didn’t want to go to the cops fearing the shame that would bring,” said the woman of the house. “A relative from Jaipur suggested a private investigator whose services she had used before. The sleuth forbade us from telling anyone of the surveillance cameras they set up in the house. Worried that my son would tell the help whom he is quite friendly with, we didn’t keep him in the loop.”
The footage left the Marwadi couple stunned as the “thief” turned out to be their 23-year-old son, who is a business management student.
“When confronted, he broke down but insisted he was only lending to friends,” the woman said. “I kept asking him if he spent it on women or booze. But my husband asked me to back off. After my daughter’s wedding, he had spoiled him with things like an expensive bike and a holiday abroad.”
This Delhiite went back to the private investigator without telling her husband. “I asked her to track my son,” she said. “Within a fortnight, she found out that he was doing drugs. Some stuff was really expensive and he took money and jewellery from the house to fund it.”
She recounted the tension over the next few days. “But now thanks to rehab and counselling, my son’s back on track and seems interested in life. We got him out of management school, where he had gone only because of his dad. He’s gone back to learning classical music. He wants to sing Sufi sings and form his own band and set up a small cafe,” and said. “In the whole episode, getting my husband to come around was tough but my gentle yet firm persistence paid off.”
Copping onto it
These are not isolated occurrences. As substance abuse spreads its tentacles from metropolises to tier-3 cities and townships, parents are suddenly finding themselves taking on the roles of detectives, counsellors and more.
Anti-Narcotics Cell DCP Lande said it was great that parents were coming forward and proactively alerting the police about such issues.
“They may be driven by an urge to save their children from the menace of drug addiction, but it ends up providing us with some very valuable inputs in tracking drugs and their movement,” he said.
The senior policeman cited the instance of an alert Mumbai builder who not only helped ween his son off drugs, but helped the police discover a new variant of weed now gaining notoriety.
“The builder’s son, a second-year B Tech student, was into drugs. The builder was concerned that right after getting back from lectures in college, he would go out partying with friends every day. When he checked his son’s Instagram profile, the builder came across a photograph on one of his Insta groups showing what he suspected to be some sort of a narcotic,” said DCP Lande. “When confronted, the son told him it was a new drug called mango weed and cost around Rs 3,000-4,000 per gram.”
The builder approached the cops and told them about the drug, even showing them a screen grab. “Initially we couldn’t believe that the weed was so expensive. A long ‘chat’ with the son helped us find out about this new strain, so priced because of its different flavour,” said one of DCP Lande’s team members who was present when the son was questioned.
It was the alertness of this parent that wised up the police about the ‘newest trend’. In the last week of November, this led to the arrest of a 27-year-old autorickshaw driver, Raj Bhagvansingh Thakur, from central Mumbai’s Parel neighbourhood while he was allegedly in possession of 1.88 kg of mango weed worth Rs 2.50 lakh. His interrogation led to the arrest of his 39-year-old associate, Tanaji Kate, on December 19, who the cops said was supplying the hybrid variant of marijuana which is sourced from Andhra Pradesh.
“Parents coming forward to seek the police’s help is a good trend. They have a major role to play in ensuring that the demand chain is broken. Closer analysis of the affected children has shown that these children, in search of a false identity, are joining groups and getting addicted to drugs,” said DCP Lande.
The identity churn
Eminent psychologist Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development can be helpful in dealing with such a situation. It says that roughly between the ages of 12 and 18, as adolescents explore their independence, they develop a sense of self. Kids who are not allowed to explore and test out different identities might be left with what Erikson referred to as role confusion. These individuals are not sure who they are or what they like. The developmental conflict needs be resolved for the primary virtue of that stage to establish itself.
Intervene wisely
Well-known psychiatrist Dr Pavan Sonar says a vacuum in communication means that children are hungry for social interaction and relationships which are critical to their development and growth.
“With both parents working and unable to afford the bandwidth for time and attention that their kids need, they try to make up for it with consumerist things like expensive gadgets, bikes, cars or designer clothes. This makes the child vulnerable to seeking this time and attention elsewhere. Unfortunately, this may come from the wrong kind of peers or people, and often at an undesirable cost,” Dr Sonar says.
“Teenagers are not mature enough to understand the long-term consequences of drugs. Research has now shown this may set off schizophrenia and other kinds of psychosis along with behavioural problems,” he adds.
As some parents might be taking cues from a nanny state increasingly interested in surveilling citizens, Dr Sonar says snooping by parents might not be bad in itself.
But he adds a caveat: “It is important for parents to remember that they are not dealing with tots but young adults. So they are well advised to broach the topic generically, keeping it non-confrontational and non-judgemental.”
As parents grapple with drug abuse by their children, they can’t help but take on a vigilante role. Somendra Sharma & Yogesh Pawar explore the contours of what parenting looks like when drugs come easy
A Bandra resident who works in a private firm in South Mumbai in a senior position was concerned for her 19-year-old. He’d get upset over trivialities and start shouting. With her husband away at work in Dubai and her elder son in the US to pursue higher studies, she decided to find out what was bothering her college-going son.
One day she snooped into his cellphone while he was in the bath. What she found shocked her. On a WhatsApp group, members were discussing prices, sellers and pick-up points for weed. Concerned, she sifted through more of her son’s stuff over the next two-three days and found a narcotic substance in his wallet. When the teen found out, he threw a fit, angry that his mother had gone through his stuff.
Helpless, the woman approached Shivdeep Lande, Deputy Commissioner of Police of Anti-Narcotics Cell (ANC), Mumbai Police. “She showed me the small polythene packet from her son’s wallet which I identified as charas [hash],” he said. “She wanted to take him to a counsellor. But I told her pressure wouldn’t work as much as talking to him. Soon, she began talking to him about his life, challenges and anxieties. I and my team also spent time counselling him,” said Lande.
The efforts bore fruit over the following months. The mother recently called Lande to tell him that her son was now totally clean.
Capital concern
In Delhi’s tony Safdarjung Enclave, a Marwadi entrepreneur and his wife were puzzled over the disappearance of cash and bits of jewellery from their home from time to time.
Concerned, they questioned the house help. They began ensuring nobody accessed the bedrooms when the family was not around. But money and trinkets continued to vanish.
“My husband didn’t want to go to the cops fearing the shame that would bring,” said the woman of the house. “A relative from Jaipur suggested a private investigator whose services she had used before. The sleuth forbade us from telling anyone of the surveillance cameras they set up in the house. Worried that my son would tell the help whom he is quite friendly with, we didn’t keep him in the loop.”
The footage left the Marwadi couple stunned as the “thief” turned out to be their 23-year-old son, who is a business management student.
“When confronted, he broke down but insisted he was only lending to friends,” the woman said. “I kept asking him if he spent it on women or booze. But my husband asked me to back off. After my daughter’s wedding, he had spoiled him with things like an expensive bike and a holiday abroad.”
This Delhiite went back to the private investigator without telling her husband. “I asked her to track my son,” she said. “Within a fortnight, she found out that he was doing drugs. Some stuff was really expensive and he took money and jewellery from the house to fund it.”
She recounted the tension over the next few days. “But now thanks to rehab and counselling, my son’s back on track and seems interested in life. We got him out of management school, where he had gone only because of his dad. He’s gone back to learning classical music. He wants to sing Sufi sings and form his own band and set up a small cafe,” and said. “In the whole episode, getting my husband to come around was tough but my gentle yet firm persistence paid off.”
Copping onto it
These are not isolated occurrences. As substance abuse spreads its tentacles from metropolises to tier-3 cities and townships, parents are suddenly finding themselves taking on the roles of detectives, counsellors and more.
Anti-Narcotics Cell DCP Lande said it was great that parents were coming forward and proactively alerting the police about such issues.
“They may be driven by an urge to save their children from the menace of drug addiction, but it ends up providing us with some very valuable inputs in tracking drugs and their movement,” he said.
The senior policeman cited the instance of an alert Mumbai builder who not only helped ween his son off drugs, but helped the police discover a new variant of weed now gaining notoriety.
“The builder’s son, a second-year B Tech student, was into drugs. The builder was concerned that right after getting back from lectures in college, he would go out partying with friends every day. When he checked his son’s Instagram profile, the builder came across a photograph on one of his Insta groups showing what he suspected to be some sort of a narcotic,” said DCP Lande. “When confronted, the son told him it was a new drug called mango weed and cost around Rs 3,000-4,000 per gram.”
The builder approached the cops and told them about the drug, even showing them a screen grab. “Initially we couldn’t believe that the weed was so expensive. A long ‘chat’ with the son helped us find out about this new strain, so priced because of its different flavour,” said one of DCP Lande’s team members who was present when the son was questioned.
It was the alertness of this parent that wised up the police about the ‘newest trend’. In the last week of November, this led to the arrest of a 27-year-old autorickshaw driver, Raj Bhagvansingh Thakur, from central Mumbai’s Parel neighbourhood while he was allegedly in possession of 1.88 kg of mango weed worth Rs 2.50 lakh. His interrogation led to the arrest of his 39-year-old associate, Tanaji Kate, on December 19, who the cops said was supplying the hybrid variant of marijuana which is sourced from Andhra Pradesh.
“Parents coming forward to seek the police’s help is a good trend. They have a major role to play in ensuring that the demand chain is broken. Closer analysis of the affected children has shown that these children, in search of a false identity, are joining groups and getting addicted to drugs,” said DCP Lande.
The identity churn
Eminent psychologist Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development can be helpful in dealing with such a situation. It says that roughly between the ages of 12 and 18, as adolescents explore their independence, they develop a sense of self. Kids who are not allowed to explore and test out different identities might be left with what Erikson referred to as role confusion. These individuals are not sure who they are or what they like. The developmental conflict needs be resolved for the primary virtue of that stage to establish itself.
Intervene wisely
Well-known psychiatrist Dr Pavan Sonar says a vacuum in communication means that children are hungry for social interaction and relationships which are critical to their development and growth.
“With both parents working and unable to afford the bandwidth for time and attention that their kids need, they try to make up for it with consumerist things like expensive gadgets, bikes, cars or designer clothes. This makes the child vulnerable to seeking this time and attention elsewhere. Unfortunately, this may come from the wrong kind of peers or people, and often at an undesirable cost,” Dr Sonar says.
“Teenagers are not mature enough to understand the long-term consequences of drugs. Research has now shown this may set off schizophrenia and other kinds of psychosis along with behavioural problems,” he adds.
As some parents might be taking cues from a nanny state increasingly interested in surveilling citizens, Dr Sonar says snooping by parents might not be bad in itself.
But he adds a caveat: “It is important for parents to remember that they are not dealing with tots but young adults. So they are well advised to broach the topic generically, keeping it non-confrontational and non-judgemental.”
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