Guwahati, Oct. 26: Government Railway Police today seized 30kg ivory from the Down Brahmaputra Mail at Guwahati railway station.

GRP personnel, out on a routine check on the train around 11.45pm, stumbled on a VIP suitcase from which nine pieces of ivory weighing 30kg was found. The suitcase was found abandoned in a sleeper coach.

No arrests could be made as the courier must have fled on spotting the policemen.

“Thirty kg of ivory cannot come from one elephant. This proves that poaching of elephants is on in full swing in the state,” a forest official said. Trade in ivory is banned.

The forest department estimates that on an average, between 10 and 20 elephants are killed in Assam every year. According to enforcement agencies, the price of one kg of ivory is estimated at Rs 10,000 at present.

The consignment could have been meant for a major gang operating outside the region as wildlife smugglers are based mainly outside.

“The haul indicates that there are ready buyers of ivory and the amount means that the trade is quite profitable,” the official said.

There are over 5,000 elephants in the wild in Assam, according to 2002 figures. “This shows that enforcement agencies now need to be more alert,” the official said.

In April, police confiscated a consignment of ivory from the cargo collection centre of Jet Airways near Lokapriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport. Additional superintendent of police (city) Rajen Singh said elephant tusk weighing 1.8kg was found inside a carton booked on a Calcutta-bound Jet Airways flight. Two persons were arrested. The most active collection areas for raw ivory are Orissa, Assam, Uttar Pradesh and Uttaranchal