April 7: Andhra Pradesh police today gunned down 20 alleged smugglers of red sanders, a protected wood with a global demand, but reports that the dead were mostly Tamil Nadu woodcutters hired by the mafia sparked inter-state tensions.
Although the police claimed to have fired in self-defence during their early morning swoop in the Seshachalam Hills near Tirupati, Tamil Nadu politicians as well as the Andhra Opposition and rights activists demanded the cops be punished for "cold-blooded murder".
Tamil Nadu chief minister O. Panneerselvam wrote to Andhra counterpart Chandrababu Naidu saying the police could have used greater restraint and arrested the villagers instead of firing on them.
He sought an inquiry into possible human rights violations, action against those who caused the deaths and adequate compensation for the families of the dead.
"Over 100 smugglers had attacked our personnel with sickles and other sharp-edged weapons," said deputy inspector-general M. Kantha Rao, who leads the special task force formed to curb smuggling of the wood, found almost exclusively in southern Andhra and coveted in east and Southeast Asia.
Officers said the encounter happened between 5am and 6am in Chittoor district when the police entered the forests after being tipped off by forest officials about the presence of 500-odd smugglers.
The state had formed the task force after the smugglers stoned two unarmed forest officials to death in December 2013. Over 3,249 people have been arrested and 2,025 tonnes of red sanders seized since then, with the police killing three smugglers in Chittoor last May when they allegedly attacked the force.
A cartel of smugglers based in Chennai, Kurnool (Andhra) and Bangalore hire villagers mainly from three Tamil Nadu districts - Villupuram, Vellore and Thiruvannamali - to chop red sanders trees into small logs and carry them to the nearest highways for Rs 3,000 per head.
Tamil Nadu politicians are asking whether the police fired warning shots before shooting the "unarmed" villagers.
MDMK leader Vaiko has sought the arrest of the cops and an inquiry by a sitting Supreme Court judge.
Chennai police have beefed up security before Telugu institutions and hotels as a precaution.
K. Balamurugan of the People's Union for Civil Liberties, an NGO, termed the killing a "planned encounter".
"The villagers used by the smugglers to cut and transport the trees are unaware of the risks. They think that cutting trees is a petty crime, so this kind of draconian action by the police is not justified," he said.
Congress leaders from both states have accused the Naidu government of killing "woodcutters and coolies" and labelling them smugglers "while the bigwigs are taking shelter in AC rooms at Tirupati hotels".
As Andhra police combed the forests for the escaped smugglers and labourers, Panneerselvam asked his officers to coordinate with their Andhra counterparts and ensure that villagers hiding in the forests were brought home safely.
Naidu has asked his officials to publish the photographs of all the dead, identify them and hand their bodies over to their families after the post-mortem. Andhra police chief J.V. Ramudu said the photos of the dead had been handed over to Tamil Nadu's police.
Prized logs
The red sanders, known as red sandalwood despite being non-aromatic, has a pinkish bark and deep-red trunk. It's endemic to a 190km belt in the Seshachalam Hills - spread across the Andhra districts of Kadapa, Chittoor, Kurnool and Nellore - and is estimated to cover an area of 4.67 lakh hectares.
It's, however, a protected species and cannot be felled or sold despite a huge demand in Malaysia and China where its oil is considered to have aphrodisiac and other curative properties.
The Japanese use the wood to make decorative pieces for homes and tombstones as they believe it brings "positive energy". In all three countries, it's used to make furniture and musical instruments too.
Among trees, the red sanders, sandalwood and rosewood are exceptional in being sold by weight and not cubic feet, since even their sawdust can be put to use. For example, the sawdust from red sanders is used as a binding agent to make anti-radiation shields in nuclear reactors.
The red sanders fetches up to Rs 30 lakh a tonne abroad. Andhra had last year earned over Rs 1,100 crore by e-auctioning 4,160 tonnes of red sanders logs seized from smugglers at Rs 27.41 lakh per tonne. It plans to sell another 8,500 tonnes.
'Sadhu' smugglers
Sometimes, the woodcutters are even disguised as sadhus entering the Seshachalam forests for meditation, police sources said.
After they ferry the logs to the highways, Innovas and Scorpios pick the logs up in the early hours of the day, for these SUVs find it easier than trucks to evade check-post scans.
Police raids have in recent years seized over 2,000 Innovas loaded with red sanders logs under the seats.
The logs are ferried to godowns in Andhra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. As Chittoor borders both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, it's ideal as a transit point.
"They are smuggled out as air or ship cargo, masquerading as food stuff, mostly with the collusion of customs officials. Sometimes, air passengers from Chennai and Delhi carry them as luggage to Kuala Lumpur and Beijing, respectively, after cutting them into smaller pieces," a forest officer from the Vellore range said.
Officers say the smugglers had to pay a cut to the Maoists when the rebels ruled the forests. The police claim to have traced K. Gangi Reddy, a red sanders smuggling kingpin who had allegedly helped the Maoists target Chandrababu Naidu with a landmine in 2003, in Mauritius and have moved court for his extradition.