Forest Department personnel attached to Gudiyatham range arrested four persons, including a resident of Andhra Pradesh, after seizing 5.5 kg hair of mongoose from one of them on Tuesday. As each mongoose has 17 to 20 grams of hair, it is suspected that they could have removed the hair from at least 500 animals.
L. Kumar, forest range officer, Gudiyatham, said they received information that a man was possessing mongoose hair.
“We alerted personnel at the Synagunda check post who nabbed Ashraf Ali (62) of AP,” he said. Four residents of Gudiyatham – S. Balaji (28), G. Kumar (53) , K. Mani (52) and Anandan (43) – had sold the hair to Ali. While the personnel nabbed three of them, Anandan is absconding.
Mr. Kumar said inquiry found that Ali had purchased mongoose hair at least seven to eight times earlier too. “The hair of mongoose is used to make expensive paint brushes used by artists,” he said.
