‘Heroin is freely available even in Tihar jail’ 

I have been addicted to heroin for 20 years. I am 34 now and trying to quit, which is not an easy task at all. The workers at a local NGO, Society for Promotion of Youth and Masses (SPYM), helped fix up a doctor’s appointment last month. The medic prescribed Addnok tablet, which is usually the cheapest medication available to get off opium addiction.

I still vividly remember the first time I did heroin one winter evening. The drug makes you feel drowsy the first time you try it. Subsequently, I started to experience a strange force gripping me each time I did heroin. It makes you feel powerful and terribly violent, even though it eats in your health. I used to be rather burly. I am not even a shadow of my former self anymore.

Hunger is the first casualty of heroin addiction. I have gone without eating anything for 24 hours on the trot. Getting food once a day, though, is not a problem around this place. Nizamuddin Dargah is frequented by tourists from the world over and I used to get by begging for food. There is also a place called Bismillah Hotel nearby, where tourists pay for our food.

Sometimes, I pick rubbish off the road and sell it; that has made me enough money to buy the drug and feed myself.

Violence has also accompanied my heroin habit over the years. Whenever the craving hit me, it made me restless and made me want to have the drug at any cost. I remember snatching a woman’s wallet back in 2005 near the Dargah, following which I was reported to the cops. They picked me up from my home and I ended up in cell number seven of Tihar Jail. I spent almost ten months in jail before being released. Heroin is freely available in the jail as well, at least it was for me.

Even before I did my jail time, I had had several encounters with cops, who are mostly patrolling streets. They treat us like scum and hit us with cane whenever they see us. I was sitting on the pavement one time, completely sober, and even then they caned me for no reason. When I questioned, they told me that all smackiya (a colloquial for a heroin addict) should be away from public view.

My parents did enrol me in school when I was 7 years old. However, I squandered the opportunity and dropped out two years later. I have been a ragpicker since, making anywhere between ₹100-150 a day. Even though I have a house in Nizamuddin, most of my nights over the last twenty years have been spent on the street. Most of the money I have been making doing the odd job has been going into feeding my heroin addiction.

My parents died three years ago. I have now come to a realisation that I made them suffer emotionally while they were alive. Though I am unmarried, I can imagine how traumatising it could be to watch your own children pressing the self-destruct button.

I wouldn’t say I have been completely clean since I started to take medication. But I do heroin less frequently than I used to do. The last time I took the drug was five days ago. I still have some of it in my packet, just in case the medication can’t check my craving.

Deep down, I know that the willpower to wean from the drug is more important than medicine. I hope I can kick the habit completely. Once my life is sorted, I want to get married and start a family.