Cannabis seized from drug dealers eaten by rats who ‘are not scared of the police’

Almost 200 kilogrammes of confiscated cannabis that was supposed to be used as evidence in a recent case was consumed by the rodents who have no fear of the authorities, a court in the city of Mathura, Uttar Pradesh, declared.

Court documents reveal that police had been asked to provide 386 kilogrammes of cannabis.

However, the prosecution highlighted the fact that more than 700 kilograms of marijuana stored in various stations across Mathura could be impacted by the rat infestation.

This is not the first time the rats had struck as the judge hearing the case pointed out.

The judge referred to a previous example when Mathura police blamed the rodents for destroying a total of more than 500 kilogrammes of cannabis that had been seized in various cases and stored at the city's Shergarh and Highway Police Station.

The court then laid down guidelines for the police to auction or dispose of the cannabis.

"There's a rat menace in almost all police stations. Hence, necessary arrangements need to be made to safeguard the cannabis that's been confiscated," the court document said.

However, accounts regarding the exact sequence of events that followed the rats' alleged consumption of the cannabis appear “a little hazy”, local media reported.

Speaking after the court case, Mathura City Police Superintendent Martand Prakash Singh told CNN that the cannabis had been "destroyed by rains and flooding" and not by rats.

"There was no reference to rats in a report submitted to the court,” he said, “the police only mentioned that the seized cannabis was destroyed in the rains and flooding.”

A 2016 study by the University of British Columbia found the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana made lab rats lazy.

Researchers trained 29 rats to perform an experiment, in which the rodents had to choose between a simple or more difficult task to earn treats.

The rats typically chose the harder, and more rewarding task, but after being given marijuana, the same rats picked the easier task.