Tiger skin, bones seized from truck in Uttarakhand’s Bazpur: Police
Ayush Aggarwal said the three suspects lived in the Jaspur area of the area and had been involved in wildlife smuggling for a long time.
HALDWANI/DEHRADUN: A joint team of wildlife, forest and police officers in Uttarakhand on Wednesday seized two tiger skin and 35kg of tiger bones from a truck in Udam Singh Nagar district’s Bazpur area and arrested three persons in this connection, police said on Thursday.
The team comprising members of Uttarakhand Special Task Force, Wildlife Crime Control Bureau and Terai Central Forest Division intercepted the truck going from Kashipur to Rudrapur after a brief chase.
“Three people were arrested and two tiger hides were found inside the vehicle after the search. The team also found around 35 kg of tiger bones in the vehicle”, said Ayush Aggarwal, senior superintendent of Police of the special task force (STF).
The three have been identified as Shamsher Singh, 23, Joga Singh, 28 and Kulwinder Singh, 60, all residents of Jaspur area.
Aggarwal added that the three suspects lived in the Jaspur area of the area and had been involved in wildlife smuggling for a long time. They were taking the tiger skin and bones to Rudrapur. One tiger skin is 9 feet 4 inches long and the other one is 11 feet 4 inches long.
The three men were carriers and it still needs to be established who killed the two tigers and where, he added.
Aggarwal, however, underlined that the three were part of a gang that had been active in Uttarakhand and bordering areas of Uttar Pradesh.
“Seven members of this gang were caught in July this year after a tiger hide and 15kg tiger bones were seized on July 22,” the SSP said, adding that Wednesday’s seizure was a result of the investigators working together on the information shared by the accused arrested in July.
The arrest comes against the backdrop of two tiger poaching incidents reported this year, a development that caused much concern in wildlife circles since the Corbett Tiger Reserve (CTR) has the highest density of tigers in the country.
According to the tiger census report released on July 29, there are 260 tigers inside CTR and 229 outside Corbett.
Citing statistics from the report, Uttarakhand’s forest officials said the latest census report indicated that there were more tigers outside Corbett than some of the major tiger reserves in the country such as Bandhavgarh (135) and Kanha (105). Kumaon’s Western Forest Circle has reported 216 tigers, while in Champawat, 11 tigers have been found. One tiger each has been found in Nainital and Almora. Ramnagar forest division in the western circle has 67 tigers while Terai West has 52 tigers.
As reported by HT last month, the significant presence of tigers outside the CTR in Kumaon has prompted the forest department to start work on a comprehensive plan to protect these tigers.
After the tiger census report was released, chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami also underlined renewed concerns about tiger poaching. With the increase in the number of tigers, he said, “tiger poachers have also started becoming active”.
At 560, Uttarakhand has the third-highest reported population of tigers in the country.
