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The upcoming round of the Union government’s National Drug Use Survey (NDUS) will run till 2026 and is expected to cover nearly 20 lakh individuals across the country to assess the extent and patterns of substance use and substance use disorders at the state and district levels, officials told The Hindu on Wednesday.
For the first time, the survey will seek to document “original forms of substance use and associated socio-economic and health problems”. Officials said there are several cases in India of communities using locally grown or prepared substances “with social sanction and ritual acceptance”.
They added that the question of whether such use is as harmful as current patterns of substance use “worth investigating”, noting that these substances can include various forms of alcoholic beverages, opium and cannabis. “Some observations suggest that such socially sanctioned use, which has persisted for centuries, does not necessarily lead to addiction. This is something that needs further investigation,” the official said.
The upcoming survey will be held almost a decade after the previous round conducted in 2017-18, which covered about five lakh individuals nationwide. A 2019 report estimated that alcohol is the most commonly used substance, with more than 15 million users, including approximately 30 million minors between the ages of 10 and 17. This was followed by cannabis, opioids, sedatives, volatile substances, cocaine, amphetamine-type stimulants and hallucinogens.
While the new round will continue to assess the prevalence and patterns of use of these substances, the 2025-26 survey will for the first time attempt detailed analyzes of substance use among specific populations, such as prisoners, school students and people enrolled in colleges and other institutions of higher education.
A previous survey attempted similar analyses, but these were not possible because such populations were not “adequately covered” in the 2019 exercise.
The upcoming round will also include studies on the feasibility of wastewater testing to assess drug use at the community level and will examine emerging trends related to the use of “newer and rarer” psychoactive substances.
The official NDUS 2025-26 website emphasizes the need for a more comprehensive assessment, stating that “drug use is dynamic” and adding that “patterns of drug use can change rapidly”, especially in the post-COVID-19 pandemic period.
The survey is expected to be completed by the end of 2026, with the findings expected to be released in 2027. Funded by the Union Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, it is being conducted by the All India Institute of Medical Sciences’ National Center for Drug Addiction.
The sample will be drawn using two methods: a household survey and a respondent-driven sample survey. The household survey will cover 400 districts in all states and Union Territories and will include men and women aged 10 to 75 years, covering about 4.4 million households and 17.6 million individuals.
In addition, the respondent-driven sample will include approximately 2.1 million individuals from drug-addicted populations in approximately 350 counties across the country. Together, these two components will result in a total sample size of about 19.7 million individuals.
The survey will also assess the impact of interventions such as the Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyaan, which was informed by the findings of the 2019 survey and is expected to generate policy recommendations for national and state-level efforts to reduce drug demand and substance-related harm.
Published – 31 Dec 2025 19:58 IST
