Thanks to poor vigil and laxity in coordination among officials, Vijayawada has been one of the transit points for red sanders smugglers.
On November 3 last year, the Chittoor Task Force team and the Penamaluru Police had jointly raided a warehouse at New Auto Nagar and seized more than 30 tonnes of red sanders logs, valued at around Rs. 100 crore. Based on information provided by N. Raja Narmada Reddy alias Naresh Reddy, who was arrested by the Putalapattu Police, Circle Inspector M. Giridhar and Sub-Inspector D. Muniswamy of Chittoor, with the help of the Vijayawada East Police, executed the operation and seized the logs.
During investigation, it was revealed that the smugglers had shifted the logs from the Seshachalam forests to Vijayawada via Nellore. The smugglers, who had developed contacts with customers abroad, had been transporting the precious wood using various modes of transport, police said.
Chittoor Superintendent of Police G. Srinivas said a smuggler, Uday Bhaskar alias Ravi Kumar of Nellore, his accomplices Y. Ramakrishna Reddy, C. Damodar Naidu and three others, who were arrested, were involved in the illegal trade in Vijayawada.
Former East Zone Assistant Commissioner of Police K.M. Maheswara Raju, who coordinated with the Chittoor Task Force police, said Uday Bhaskar used to bring labourers from Tamil Nadu for loading and unloading of logs, and that he never engaged locals to maintain his trade secret.
“Ravi Kumar has been involved in red sanders smuggling for the past eight years and has smuggled logs worth crores of rupees,” the SP added.
