In a huge catch, officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), Vijayawada Unit, busted an international star tortoises smuggling racket on Tuesday. They seized 406 tortoises being exported to Bangladesh.
Officials suspect that the tortoises are being exported through the Paradeep Port in Odisha. Star tortoises are protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and declared vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
On a tip-off that they were being transported in the Vivek Express, the DRI team headed by its Deputy Director V. Ramakrishna and the Railway Protection Force (RPF) conducted a search in the railway station and recovered the tortoises packed in sacks.
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Women held
They arrested two women who were carrying the four sacks. The Forest Department officials of the Eluru Wildlife Division, who inspected the spot, confirmed that they were Indian star tortoises. “The accused were transporting the tortoises from Kadiri to Bhubaneswar. Export of star tortoises is prohibited under Foreign Trade Policy and is liable for confiscation under the Customs Act, 1962. The accused would be produced in the Economic Offences Court, Visakhapatnam, on Wednesday,” a DRI official told
Krishna District Forest Officer (DFO) P.J. Benarjee said star tortoises were listed in the Schedule-IV of the Wild Life Protection Act, 1972.
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Accused to be grilled
“The DRI officials handed over the tortoises to the forest officials. We will produce them before the court and release them into the nature. All the star tortoises are preserved,” Mr. Benarjee said.
Senior Divisional Security Commissioner (South Central Railway) S.R. Gandhi said the accused were travelling from Dibrugarh to Kanyakumari in a general compartment.
“We helped the DRI sleuths in seizing the tortoises,” he said.
“The accused are natives of Chittoor district. We are trying to find out how and from where they collected the tortoises, since how long the smuggling has been going on, locals involved in the racket, details of Bangladesh smugglers and other particulars,” the DRI official said.