Six held in Jalgaon district: Woman attempting to smuggle tigress skin under saree arrested, hide seized

Officers from Pune Customs said the action was a fallout of meticulous surveillance they kept on a syndicate headed by a suspect named Mohammad Athar (58), who hails from Madhya Pradesh and who first came under their radar in August last year. Commissioner of Customs Pune, Yashodhan Wanage said, “In August last year we had seized a leopard skin worth Rs one crore as part of an action in Satara. We had arrested one person at the time and had found out that the skin was being smuggled to be sold to foreign buyers. The name of one Mohammad Athar had surfaced in that operation for his involvement in wildlife trade. We kept a close watch on the syndicate which Athar was a part of.”

Wanage added, “Last month we received intel that a tiger trophy, which is the skin of a tiger suspected to have been killed in the 1970s, was being brought to Pune from Madhya Pradesh to be sold through the syndicate. We intercepted that tiger trophy, believed to be worth Rs two crore, and seized it in Pune last month and arrested two persons. We did not release details of the action to the media as our team was working on more crucial leads. The intelligence was developed further and we have now recovered the skin of a recently killed tiger, estimated to be worth Rs five crore. We have arrested six persons in the action conducted in Jalgaon on July 26.”

Arrested suspects have been identified as Ajvar Sujat Bhosale (35), Rahim Pardhi (45), Teva Bai Pardhi (40), Kakana Bai (30), Nadim Shaikh (26) and Athar. The arrests and seizure were made in a joint action that the Pune Customs team conducted with the Nagpur Customs team.

A Customs officer said, “Initial probe suggests the skin we seized in Jalgaon is of a fully grown tigress aged between four to five years. Probe suggests that poachers had first located a carcass of an antelope killed and partially eaten by this tigress. The poachers are believed to have then poisoned the carass with a pesticide. When the tigress came back to continue consuming the carcass, she got poisoned. The probe suggests that the tigress did not die immediately. The poachers further tracked it and killed her by drowning her in a stream. Probe suggests that this happened around 45 days ago in a forest area on the border of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. Our team visited the area in the forest where the animal was killed and the place where it was skinned. Our team has also recovered the other body parts of the tiger, which also have a high value in the international illegal market.”

Officials said they also investigated the geotag trace of the tigress and investigation was handed over to the Maharashtra forest department for further probe.

“Two of the arrested suspects are women. When our team intercepted the suspects on the morning of July 26 on Jalgaon Bhusawal Road, we found that one of the arrested women was wearing the skin under her saree to conceal it.

Probe suggests that Athar, who masterminded this wildlife smuggling syndicate, used to buy animal skins from the poachers or animal trophies from people who had them and sell them to buyers in India or abroad.” the officer added.

Customs officers said that with the arrest in August last year, the two arrests made last month and the latest six arrests, a total of nine persons have been arrested in the three interlinked investigations. A leopard skin worth Rs one crore seized last, a more than 50 year old tiger trophy worth over Rs two crore and skin of a tigress killed around 45 days ago, worth over Rs five crore, takes the total seizure in these cases to Rs 9 crore.