It may begin with a message on a mobile phone, a promise of easy money or an attractive offer of a car. But for some teenagers and young men in Punjab, the harmless online contact is turning into a gateway to drugs, weapons and organised crime.Amritsar Police Commissioner Harmanbir Singh Gill sounded an alarm over what he described as a changing method of recruiting youngsters into criminal networks. Pakistan-based drug traffickers, he said, were increasingly using the social media to establish contact with youngsters, including minors, before gradually drawing them into illegal activities.He was speaking at a public meeting held under “Operation Sampark” in Subdivision East on Monday. The recruitment, he said, did not necessarily begin with drugs or guns, adding that a conversation could also do the needful.Youngsters are allegedly offered money, vehicles or other incentives for carrying out small tasks. Once they become part of the network, they are gradually pushed towards more serious offences. And, when they try to walk away, threats and intimidation are allegedly used to keep them trapped. What makes the trend particularly worrying for the police is the age profile of those coming under the scanner.Gill said during police action in the border belt over the past nearly two months, several youngsters had been arrested and many of them were in the 17-25 age-group. For the police, the numbers point to a larger social problem than merely a rise in crime cases. The Commissioner urged parents to know what their wards were doing online, talk to them every day and spend time understanding their problems. In an age when a smartphone can put a teenager in direct contact with strangers across the border, he said parental vigilance had become as important as policing.Gill recalled the years of terrorism when violence took a toll on the state’s youth, business and industry, with several industrial units moving out of Punjab. He cautioned that attempts to weaken the state were continuing through newer channels, with drugs, illegal weapons and criminal networks being used to draw youngsters into the world of crime. But this time, the battlefield is not necessarily a street or a hideout. It can be a smartphone screen.Gill stressed that the police wanted to intervene before a youngster became a hardened criminal. Those already trapped in drugs or gangsterism but willing to change, he said, could approach the police directly. The department would make efforts to help them leave the criminal network and rebuild their lives.Gill said the residents could report information about drug trafficking or anti-social elements on the Amritsar police drug helpline (77101-04818) or the Safe Punjab Anti-Drug Helpline (97791-00200).