Lucknow, March 27 : The Uttar Pradesh government is working on a war-footing to complete the construction of six new state-of-the-art forensic labs in the state.

This will further strengthen the Anti-Narcotics Task Force (ANTF) in eliminating the narco nexus in the state.

The new labs are being built in Saharanpur, Ayodhya, Banda, Basti, Mirzapur and Azamgarh. The state will now have a total of 18 forensic labs. At present, 12 labs are functional in different districts.

A government spokesperson said with the new labs, it would be easy to combat drug traffickers.

Deputy Inspector General (DIG), ANTF, Abdul Hamid, said that it takes a long time to send the seized drugs to the forensic lab for testing. At the same time, it takes more than 15 days to receive the test results for these samples.

"The new forensic lab will reduce the time it takes to deliver drug tests. In addition, the investigation report for these samples will be available within a week, which will help in putting drug dealers behind bars through effective court cases," he said.

An amount of Rs 37.25 lakh will be released soon for the purchase of modern equipment for ANTF.

Since the formation of ANTF in the last six months, 16 actions were taken in 11 districts of the state by the force.