Bhubaneswar: Wildlife products, including Himalayan musk deer pods, were seized from a gems store in Bhubaneswar during a joint raid by Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) and Wildlife Justice Commission (WJC).
The seized articles also include soft corals (Gorgonia species) and a large number of protected sea shells, derivatives of red corals, pangolin scale rings and body parts of monitor lizard valued at around Rs 2 million. These are protected under schedule 1 of the Wildlife Protection Act and prohibited under appendix 1 and 3 of CITES.
Eight persons have been detained in this connection.
“The raid was in continuation of the seizure of protected marine species at Vijayawada in June when the international foundation headquartered in Hague had stumbled upon intelligence on marine wildlife trade between coastal Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Andaman Nicobar and upper Himalayas to Bhubaneswar, with likelihood of trade link between India and South East Asia,” South Asia head of WJC Shekhar Kumar Niraj told TNIE.
The seized articles would be handed over to Wildlife Wing of the state for prosecution, he added.
In June, officials of the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau, the WJC and the AP Wildlife authorities seized a huge quantity of dead and processed sea fans (soft corals), porcupine quills and 60 varieties of rare sea shells from a trader, S Srinivas Rao, in Vijayawada. He was allegedly smuggling and selling the sea fans, corals and other wildlife items.
Bhubaneswar/Cuttack: Amid statewide outrage over alleged gang-rape of a girl college student in Odisha's Cuttack…
New Delhi: A controversy has erupted in Himachal Pradesh over samosas that went missing from…
Bhubaneswar: An IT engineer was arrested by the Commissionerate Police on Friday on charges of…
Bhubaneswar: The Odisha Vigilance sleuths on Friday apprehended medical officer in-charge of Boipariguda Community Health…
New Delhi: Men should not tailor clothes for women or cut a woman’s hair either,…
Bhubaneswar: Driver of a bus died and over 30 passengers sustained injuries as the vehicle…
New Delhi: The rupee fell 5 paise to an all-time low of 84.37 against the…
Srinagar: For the third day in a row, the Jammu and Kashmir assembly on Friday…