author
Roy K. Anderson
A firsthand chronicler of colonial Burma’s drug trade, he wrote with the authority of someone working inside the excise system. His surviving book offers a vivid, early-20th-century look at smuggling, addiction, and enforcement in India and Burma.
1 Audiobook
Drug Smuggling and Taking in India and Burma
by Roy K. Anderson
About the author
Little confirmed biographical information about Roy K. Anderson appears to be readily available online, but his 1922 book Drug Smuggling and Taking in India and Burma gives a clear sense of his professional background and interests. On the title page, he is identified as Superintendent, Burma Excise Department and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (F.R.S.A.), suggesting he wrote from direct administrative experience.
Anderson is known for Drug Smuggling and Taking in India and Burma, a nonfiction work first published in 1922. The book examines opium, cocaine, hemp drugs, smuggling networks, and the challenges of enforcement in British India and Burma, blending official knowledge with observation from the field.
Because so little else could be confirmed from reliable sources during this search, his public profile today rests mainly on that book and its historical value. Readers interested in colonial-era policy, narcotics control, or the social history of South and Southeast Asia may find his work especially revealing.