Bangalore/Davanagere, Dec 22: The sleuths of the City Crime Branch (CCB) and wildlife officials on Wednesday raided the farm house that belongs to Congress leader S.S. Mallikarjuna in Davanagere and seized several wildlife animals.
“In all, we have seized 17 deers including seven spotted ones, seven wild boars and two mongoose from the farm house of S. S.Mallikarjun, son of Congress leader Shyamanur Shivashankarapa, behind Kalleshwara Mills” officials told the reporters.
The CCB and Wildlife officials got a tip off when they had arrested one Senthil at Hebbal in Bangalore. This Senthil was selling deer skin, deer horns and other wildlife animal materials.
“We suspected the way in which he was roaming around in and around Hebbal areas. We apprehended him. During interrogation, he revealed that he got these materials from Davanagere. Further investigation brought us to the farm house belonging to Mallikarjun,” officials explained.
Mallikarjun, meanwhile, has maintained that he had obtained permission from the authorities to take care of these animals in his farm house. “The man who was assigned the responsibility of looking after the animals has sold the materials without our knowledge and we know it is illegal,” he said.
However, officials asserted that there is no scope in the wildlife act to give permission. “We will ascertain the truth very shortly,” N.H. Jagannath, District Forest Officer (DFO) said.
According to officials, permission has sought from the local court to appoint an Investigating Officer (IO) to investigate the matter under various provisions of the Wildlife Act. “Once the investigation is completed we will file charge-sheet”, they added.
Meanwhile, Wildlife officials have seized the animals and sent to the local zoo.
CCB officials as well as the forest department officers had suspected that there was a racket involving several suspicious characters in dealing with wildlife animals and had kept an eye. “We are not sure whether some more are involved in this racket. Further investigation may throw light on the issue,” a top CCB official said.
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