The skulls and bones seized at New Jalpaiguri Station yesterday and (inset) Lama. Picture by Avijit Sarkar

Siliguri, Jan. 29: As the patrolling jeep stopped a rickshaw in front of New Jalpaiguri Station for a routine check, the man sitting inside the vehicle, clutching a big gunny bag carefully placed near his foot, looked worried. When the police opened the sack, it was their turn to be alarmed.

Stacked inside the sack were several human skulls and bones. The Siliguri police later counted 100 skulls and three bones inside the sack and admitted they were baffled by the “unusual” contents.

If 30-year-old Sangey Lama, arrested with the consignment, is to be believed, the trade of human skulls and bones is a “thriving” business.

Another mystery for the police is the similarity in the contents of the bag found yesterday and the one that was recovered in 2001. Siliguri police had seized a sack with 100 craniums from the Sikkim Nationalised Transport bus terminus in Pradhannagar. No one had been arrested.

“The skull haul throws light on the thriving business of human skulls and bones. What is confounding is the source of such a large number of skulls. It also confirms our suspicion that an organised gang is involved in the racket. The skulls, seized on both the occasions, have only the cranium left. Human skulls and bones like the femur and humerus are in great demand in the remote hill pockets of Sikkim and Bhutan,” said a senior district police official.

Lama told the police he was coming from Gaya and taking the short cut to Siliguri via Deshbandhupara.

On interrogation, Lama revealed he had purchased the skulls from a “dealer” in Gaya.

“We are aware that skulls are used for religious purposes in Sikkim by Buddhist monks who practice tantrik rituals but the similarity between the two hauls has prompted us to look at the case from a different angle,” said Siliguri additional superintendent of police Rajiv Mishra.

“That the craniums were intact is also surprising. Skulls from exhumed bodies cannot usually be recovered in their full form. We are not ruling out the possibilities of a genocide or mass murder as the method of acquiring such a hideous consignment,” Mishra told The Telegraph.

“We are also verifying the credentials of Lama, who claims he is a resident of Sikkim. The Sikkim and Bihar police have been contacted. Lama said each skull fetched anything between Rs 150 and 200,” the police official added.

Lama was produced in the Siliguri subdivisional judicial magistrate’s court and has been remanded in judicial custody.