Forest department officials have taken action against four people who had allegedly killed a wild boar inside a forest near Padgha village in Thane district’s Bhiwandi taluka and were selling the meat.

Range Forest Officer Shailesh Deore said, “We had got a tip-off from our sources that some people were going to kill animals and sell the bushmeat, following which we created a strategy and approached the forest, which is in our jurisdiction.”

At around 5 pm on Wednesday, when a team under the leadership of RFO Deora approached the forest patch near Kudvadpada in Pashchapur circle, they spotted some people carrying out suspicious activities.

“When we reached the spot, we saw some people who started fleeing after seeing us. On advancing, we saw a tarpaulin lying at the spot on which there was bushmeat. 

We managed to catch two people red-handed and we have recovered knives and wild boar meat,” said Deore.

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The RFO added that meat samples have been sent to Nagpur for forensic analysis.

Sources from the forest department told this newspaper that their during interrogation, the accused confessed that they had 
killed a wild boar in the forest and it was not their first time. The forest department also suspects that the accused may have been involved in other wildlife-related crimes.

The accused, Mahendra Bhala and Bhagwan Laxman Sarai, are residents of Mohandul in Bhiwandi. They were arrested under various sections of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, and were sent to forest custody.

On Sunday, the department arrested two others who were also allegedly involved in the incident.

5
Day in February when second arrests took place

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