Alipurduar, Aug. 26: A suspected timber smuggler was killed and two forest staff members were injured in an encounter between a patrol team and a gang at Moraghat this morning.

Around 1.30am, a team of five foresters on patrol spotted some smugglers felling a tree at compartment I of north Moraghat. The area is under Jalpaiguri division.

When the foresters challenged the smugglers, the gang surrounded them. “The patrol team fired one round in the air to disperse the gang but instead of going away, the smugglers threatened our staff,” Kalyan Das, the divisional forest officer of Jalpaiguri, said. He added that the 20-25 member gang attacked the guards with daggers, arrows and stones.

In the scuffle two forest staffs were injured. They have been admitted to the Birpara State General Hospital. “The foresters had to fire one more round in the air for their own safety,” said Das. He added that the patrol team spotted an injured member of the gang and took him to the Dhupguri rural hospital where the doctors pronounced him brought dead. “We suspect that he died in the firing,” said the DFO.