The Chittoor II-Town police on Sunday nabbed six red sanders smuggling operatives from Tamil Nadu, while they were moving suspiciously in the bushes at Obanapalle locality along the Bengaluru bypass road. Six red sanders logs and an SUV were seized from them.
Circle-Inspector Venkatappa said that a week ago the smugglers were on their way to Chennai carrying the logs when their SUV had developed a snag. They hid the logs in the bushes of a local tank and left for Chennai.
After a week, they returned on Sunday to retrieve the logs from the bushes and were waiting for an SUV for transportation. Acting on a tip-off, the raid party led by Sub-Inspector Umamaheshwar Reddy rushed to the spot and arrested the accused.
The operatives were identified as Palaniswamy (25) of Papireddipatti of Dharmapuri district; V. Andiappan (25) M. Venkatesan (28) and Rathinam (24) of Pambagutta village of Tirupattur Taluk of Vellore district; Chennayan (21) and Vediyappan (37) of Umminur of Uttangaram Taluk of Krishnagiri district.
Their modus operandi was to procure the logs from the maistries at the foot of the Seshachalam Hills at various entry and exit points and transport them to Chennai for a price. The accused were remanded.
Two woodcutters held
The Red Sanders Anti-Smuggling Task Force sleuths nabbed two woodcutters from Tamil Nadu and recovered 33 red sanders logs from them, during combing at Ragimanukunta area of the Seshachalam forest in the early hours of Sunday.
The team led by Reserve Sub-Inspector Vasu sighted around 40 woodcutters carrying logs and surrounded them.
The wood-cutters hurled sticks and stones at them to flee in the cover of darkness. The sleuths could successfully lay their hands on two of them, who were identified as Sivakumar of Villupuram district and another Sivakumar of Salem district.
