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Source : http://www.tehelka.com/story_main47.asp?filename=Ne021010Cover_story.asp

The Poverty of Plenty

It’s not stones. It’s not land. Something else is eating away India’s most robust state. VIJAY SIMHA tracks the unnoticed story of the year

BY VIJAY SIMHA
PHOTOGRAPHS BY SHAILENDRA PANDEY

Bird of brass An increasingly common sight in Punjab: commoners jostle for space with the ultra rich

THE 25 crore man stepped in like a thief, eyes wary, searching for a sign that he must run. Jagbeer Singh. Farmer. Bus conductor. Father. Heroin smuggler. Jailbird. Nobody. After months of being a recluse, Jagbeer, one-time shining hope for friends and family, emerged into a Punjab he didn’t like. When he was caught with 25 kilos of heroin in 1997, worth Rs. 25 crore in the international market, Jagbeer became an instant celeb: his was the biggest heroin haul then. “They used to come to see what a Rs. 25 crore man looked like,” he says. Now, when he’s out after 12 years, only two kinds are interested. The sleuths, who come every fortnight to see if Jagbeer has anything to snitch on, and the peddlers, waiting to see if he is game for another shot. “I stay in and wonder how it happened to me. When I went into jail, there were a dozen drug offenders. When I was released, there were 65. There are a thousand peddlers in Punjab today,” he says. He doesn’t know it yet, but experts have begun to put an expiry date on Punjab, once the sentinel state of India. And it’s not just drugs that’s doing it.

I AM TOO scared,” says Jagbeer. He has a