4 sandalwood smugglers arrested

New Delhi: The special task force (STF) of the Delhi police has busted an international Red Sandalwood smuggling racket. The STF has arrested 4 persons in connection with the smuggling and nearly 4.5 tonnes of Red Sandalwood was recovered from a truck during the raid.

The worth of the seized goods is said to be about Rs 1.40 crore in the Indian market and Rs 4.2 crore in the Chinese market.

“On Friday, a secret information was received that a truck number 5236 carrying huge quantity of red sandalwood would pass through Ring Road. On this information, a raiding party was formed. The team laid a trap near Ashram Chowk and intercepted a truck at 9 pm and apprehended three persons, namely Krishan, Ravinder and Neeraj Sahgal, who were sitting in the truck,” said Crime Branch DCP Dr Ram Gopal Naik.

“A search of the truck was made and 133 logs were recovered from the truck, which were concealed behind the cartons of incense sticks. To identify the recovered logs, a wildlife inspector was called on the spot, who identified the recovered logs as Red Sanders (Pterocarpus Santalinus). Total number of Red Sandalwood logs were found to be 133 and each log was measured and weighed at the spot. Total weight of 133 logs was found to be around 4580 kg,” he added.

Accordingly, a case Indian Forest Act was registered and all three accused persons were arrested. At the instance of the accused Neeraj Sahgal, another person namely Nikhil Salwan has also been apprehended and more arrests are likely to be followed with recovery of more Red Sandalwood as the raids are still going on at various places in Delhi/NCR

During interrogation, it was revealed that they loaded the trucks with Red Sandalwood from a transportation centre in Bengaluru.