Red sanders smuggling: 10 TN woodcutters arrested in AP

Red sanders smuggling: 10 TN woodcutters arrested in AP

shanmughasundaram.j@timesgroup.com

Tiruvannamalai:

The Red Sanders Anti-Smuggling Task Force (RSASTF) in Andhra Pradesh arrested 10 men hailing from Jawadhu Hills in Tamil Nadu in three different incidents on Sunday.

 On Sunday morning, an RSASTF team engaged in vehicle check at Kanumalpalli in Kadapa district intercepted a tanker lorry. The team found 93 logs of red sanders stacked inside the tanker. The police arrested six men.

 Later, they arrested three men for smuggling 10 red sander logs in a car.  The worth of the seized logs estimated over Rs 1 crore. The police confiscated the lorry and the car used by the smugglers.

 Around 5.30pm on Sunday, another RSASTF team arrested a 25-year-old woodcutter hailing from Jawadhu Hills during a combing operation in Mamandur forest area and launched a search for his associates, who had disappeared into the reserve forest area.

 The 10-member RSASTF team spotted a group of men camping inside the Mamandur forest and preparing food. The red sanders smugglers threw stones and logs on the police personnel and disappeared into the forest area. The team managed to arrest one of them, identified as Anbu.

 On questioning, he told the police that a group of 30 men from Irumbuli village and neighbouring villages in Jawadhu Hills had come to fell trees.

 It was also revealed that Anbu had sustained injuries when he had tried to escape from the task force six months ago and subsequently arrested. He got bail two months ago.

 Anbu allegedly told the police that he and others had come to Andhra forests after an AP policeman, identified as Rajadurai, had contacted them and lured them to the forest. Rajadurai allegedly told them that he had bribed forest and police department personnel in charge of Mamandur jurisdiction.  

Based on his statement, the task force personnel collected the telephone numbers of Anbu and others to check if any policemen had been in contact with them.

There was a surge in red sander smuggling in the recent past. The seizures of huge quantity of red sander logs in the recent past in Vellore district proved it beyond a shadow of a doubt.

The forest and police departments have seized over 10 tonnes of red sander logs since May this year.

In a joint operation, on November 26, the police and forest department personnel conducted a raid at poultry farm at Pappathoppu in Solavaram near Vellore and seized 131 logs, weighing around four tonnes.

Similarly, the forest protection squad of the forest department conducted a raid at a house in Chinnathakkai village near Arcot on last Wednesday (December 13) and impounded 23 logs of red sanders that weighing 797 kgs. The raid was conducted when the smugglers loading the logs to a car to ferry them to Chennai.

In the first week of May, the police personnel attached to Arakkonam Sub-Division seized nearly five tonnes of logs during vehicle check. The police arrested two persons, including C Nagaraj of Tiruvannamalai, and confiscated a container lorry and a mini-van. They vehicles were intercepted when they were smuggling the logs to Chennai from Andhra Pradesh./eom/shan/