2 held in Odisha’s Keonjhar Forest Division for smuggling elephant tusks

By Express News Service

BHUBANESWAR: The Special Task Force (STF) of Odisha Police and Keonjhar forest division have arrested two wildlife criminals on costs of possessing and smuggling elephant tusks. The accused Ramakanta Pradhan (38) and Anama Munda (35) are from Kalanda village underneath Raisuan in Keonjhar.

Tusks recovered from the accused

Acting on intelligence inputs, an STF group together with Keonjhar forest officers nabbed Ramakanta red-handed with the 2 elephant tusks weighing 5.662 kg from Patung-Kalanda highway on Sunday. 

The group additionally seized a number of incriminating supplies from Ramakanta’s possession. As the accused couldn’t produce paperwork in help of the possession of the wildlife objects, he was arrested and handed over to the Keonjhar division, STF officers stated. 

The recovered objects had been additionally handed over to the Keonjhar division for additional investigation. Later a group of Keonjhar forest division interrogated the accused and got here to find out about involvement of two others in smuggling of the tusks. They then nabbed Anama on Sunday evening.

DFO Dhamdhere Dhanraj Hanumant stated efforts are on to arrest the third accused who’s suspected to be the prime suspect within the case. Preliminary findings counsel that the tusks recovered from the accused are two years previous.

STF officers stated within the particular drives in opposition to the wildlife criminals and poachers launched since 2020, they’ve seized no less than 25 leopard pores and skin, 15 elephant tusks, seven  deer skins, 11 pangolin, 19.5 kg pangolin scales, two leopard tooth and 29 leopard claws together with 46 parrots. Around 59 individuals have been arrested throughout these seizures, they stated.