Bargarh: Forest officials prevented 3 persons from hunting wild animals and arrested them from Debrigarh Sanctuary in Odisha’s Bargarh district on early morning of Sunday.
On information of movement of the three poachers from Kuketira and Rengali in the district to the sanctuary, the Forest officials intensified the patrolling in the zone. A night patrolling team of Hirakud Wildlife Division was pressed into service.
The team, headed by Forester, lady Forest Guard and 10 squads, traced the poachers during patrolling in periphery areas of the sanctuary near Rengali Beat of the district.
“When our squad tried to nab the poachers, the latter fired at our staff. Later, the Forest squad nabbed the poachers and seized a country-made gun, knife, axe and matchstick from their possession,” a Forest official said. Due to their arrest, they were prevented from committing the poaching, he added.
Preliminary investigation revealed that the poachers procured the country-made guns from Megpal and Basupali villages near Kisinda area of Sambalpur district. They were poaching wild animals to sell their meat, skin and horns.
The arrested poachers have been identified as Subhas Gardia of Kuketira village and Raghupati Dharua and Digambar Sahu of Rengali village in Bargarh district. They were forwarded to Attabira court on Sunday and further investigation is under progress.
Six teams of Forest officials have been patrolling 24×7 in periphery areas, two troops on the border and 12 teams inside the sanctuary. The department has set up 5 control rooms operated by trained VHF operators for sharing the information about poachers.
The department has also announced a reward of Rs 1,000 for information about the poachers. The posters in this regard have been distributed in the sanctuary area since December last year when a tiger entered Debrigarh and was spotted in the area of 100 villages surrounding it.
