"Panchayati Raj Institutions Integrated Into Grassroots Drug Prevention Under NMBA"
Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyan (NMBA)
MoSJE's flagship campaign for community-led drug demand reduction at grassroots level.
National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction (NAPDDR)
overarching central plan governing awareness, treatment, and rehabilitation expenditure.
India's drug abuse control architecture rests on the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985, which consolidated earlier fragmented legislation and established stringent penalties for production, sale, possession, and trafficking of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances. The Act has been amended in 1989, 2001, and 2014 to address synthetic drugs, precursor chemical monitoring, and to draw a legal distinction between addicts requiring treatment and traffickers requiring punishment. India is also a signatory to three binding UN conventions — the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs (1961), the Convention on Psychotropic Substances (1971), and the UN Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (1988) — embedding its domestic policy within an international legal framework.
Institutionally, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (MoSJE) is the nodal ministry for drug demand reduction, while the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) under the Ministry of Home Affairs handles supply-side enforcement. The National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction (NAPDDR) is the overarching expenditure framework governing awareness, treatment, and rehabilitation activities. Within NAPDDR, the State Action Plan (SAP) component channels financial assistance to State Governments and Union Territory Administrations for preventive education, capacity building, and demand reduction activities. The Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyan (NMBA), launched as a focused campaign, operationalises NAPDDR's demand-reduction goals through community-level mobilisation, targeting high-prevalence districts across the country.
The urgency of this framework is underscored by a 2019 national survey that found over 2.26 crore opioid users in India, with disproportionately high prevalence in Punjab, the Northeast, and coastal districts. India's geographic position between the Golden Triangle (Southeast Asia) and the Golden Crescent (Afghanistan-Pakistan-Iran) makes it both a transit and consumption country, creating a dual challenge of supply-side trafficking linked to organised crime and demand-side addiction as a public health crisis.
The Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyan is a demand-reduction campaign under the MoSJE that seeks to build a people-led movement against substance abuse by engaging communities, educational institutions, civil society organisations, and local governance bodies. Its operational logic is that enforcement alone cannot address addiction — sustained behavioural change requires community ownership, which is best achieved through trusted local intermediaries rather than distant state machinery.
The role of Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) in this framework is constitutionally grounded. The 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992 inserted Part IX into the Constitution, establishing a three-tier Panchayati Raj system and empowering Gram Panchayats with functions listed in the Eleventh Schedule, which includes social welfare and public health. …
The fundamental object of Panchayati Raj system is to ensure which among the following?
1.People's participation in development
2.Political accountability
3.Democratic decentralization
4.Financial mobilization
Select the correct answer using the code given below.
Consider the following statements:
1.The minimum age prescribed for any person to be a member of Panchayat is 25 years.
2.A Panchayat reconstituted after premature dissolution continues only for the remainder period.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Consider the following statements:
I.Panchayats at the intermediate level exist in all States.
II.To be eligible to be a Member of a Panchayat at the intermediate level, a person should attain the age of thirty years.
III.The Chief Minister of a State constitutes a commission to review the financial position of Panchayats at the intermediate levels and to make recommendations regarding the distribution of net proceeds of taxes and duties, leviable by the State, between the State and Panchayats at the intermediate level.
Which of the above are not correct?
With reference to the Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyan (NMBA), consider the following statements:
1.It is implemented by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
2.Panchayat Resource Persons are being engaged as Nasha Mukti Mitras under this campaign.
3.The National De-addiction Helpline number under NMBA is 14446.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Which of the following correctly describes the relationship between NAPDDR and the State Action Plan (SAP)?
Consider the following statements regarding the constitutional provisions for Panchayati Raj Institutions:
1.The 73rd Constitutional Amendment inserted Part IX and the Eleventh Schedule into the Constitution.
2.The Eleventh Schedule lists 29 subjects including social welfare and public health that may be devolved to Panchayats.
3.Article 243F prescribes the minimum age for Panchayat membership as 25 years.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Assertion (A): India's drug policy framework combines a punitive approach under the NDPS Act with a demand-reduction approach through NAPDDR and NMBA.
Reason (R): The NDPS Act, 1985 was amended in 2001 to draw a distinction between drug addicts requiring treatment and traffickers requiring punishment.
Which of the following is correct?
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