Forest officials with the haul. Picture by Ujjwal Baral

Nilpara (Alipurduar), Jan. 6: Officials of the Cooch Behar forest division today arrested two persons from Jaigaon and seized a 15-ft skin of a python, a pelt of a spotted deer and an antler from them.

The arrested persons, Mani Kumar Tamang ? hailing from Bhutan ? and Bimal Biswakarma, are reportedly members of a gang that smuggles animal parts across the border. The pelts and the antlers are worth at least Rs 3 lakh in the international market, a source said.

Acting on a tip-off, a team comprising staff members of the Madarihat range, Jaldapara east, west and north ranges and the flying squad arrested the smugglers from a place adjacent to the Torsha at Trolly Line in the Jaigaon police station area. The team was led by Anjan Guha, the assistant wildlife warden of Jaldapara, and U.K. Nag, the additional divisional forest officer of Cooch Behar.

This haul follows a recent raid during which a group of forest officials had seized smuggled animal parts and arrested a couple of persons from the same area. During interrogation, the smugglers confessed to the presence of a smuggling racket in the region. Based on the information, forest officials identified a number of linkmen involved in the racket and started keeping a close watch on them.

The vigil paid off today when forest personnel caught the smugglers red-handed just as Tamang came to Trolly Line to take the consignment of animal skins from Biswakarma, the source said. Tamang was supposed to smuggle the pelts to Bhutan, he added. Both the arrested persons were later forwarded to the court of the assistant chief judicial magistrate of Alipurduar.

?The arrested persons are members of a gang involved in cross-border smuggling of animal parts. But this is the first time that we have arrested a resident of Bhutan,? said Manindra Chandra Biswas, the divisional forest officer of Cooch Behar from the Nilpara range office. ?Animal parts are often being smuggled from Bengal to Bhutan, but until now, we had failed to arrest any person from that side. Now, we hope to extract valuable information from Tamang on how the racket works in Bhutan.?

Forest officials refused to divulge anything more about the racket as they feel that it would hamper their investigation.