Arunachal- Roing Police Bust Illegal Timber Trade Racket
Roing- The Roing police busted a illegal Timber Trade racket and arrested not only kingpin behind the whole operation, apprehended the drivers, owner of the saw mill and several middlemen involved in the racket informed Sanjay Kumar Sain, SP Lower Dibang Valley.
The kingpin who is identified as one Raju Medhi of Dhola, a timber merchant with a timber depot at Dhola known for supplying timber in the entire country as well several foreign countries as well, SP informed.
Police also seized a pistol along with 13 live rounds and huge cache of cash from the possession of Raju Medhi. During the investigation he also revealed that he is in possession of arms license which also seems to be illegally obtained from Pasighat in the year 2019. The arrested person has revealed names of several of his accomplices, one of which is the brother of a sitting MLA of Arunachal Pradesh.
Expressing details of the whole operation, SP informed that ” A team led by Dy SP Ringu Ngupok, Inspector R.K Mishra, OC Roing Mohon Milli and OC Shantipur S.S Jha under the supervision of SP Roing Sanjay Kumar Sain has been on a mission to control the illegal timber trade rampant in the state.
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On 14/06/2020 the team had apprehended two 14-wheeler trucks laden with timber and then had uncovered a racket where transit pass was obtained from the office of DFO Pasighat while the timber was being obtained by cutting trees in the reserved forest of Namsai, Roing and Tezu forest division. Using the transit pass them the timber was being smuggled to Assam.
Apart from the above incident, Roing Police has been conducting regular raids on all the possible mills, routes etc in the district etc use for smuggling round timber from the district to mills in Chowkham.
On 13/07/2020, the team had confiscated one truck bearing registration number AS-23-AC-1278 carrying expensive variety of wood. As the tram was pursuing the truck, the driver crashed the truck against the police and escaped from the spot.
Then again yesterday Roing Police team had again confiscated two trucks carrying round timber to Chowkham and had arrested five persons.
The drive as learned will continue in the future and might lead to arrest of various others involved in the said illegal timber trade.
Further SP informed that, ” they have registered three cases in this regards which are being investigated jointly by the team. Further he informed that till now they have arrested 10 persons and have confiscated five trucks of different sizes laden with timber ranging from A to B quality” .
As per the investigation taken by the team till now it is clear that trees are being cut from the regions of Tezu, Roing and Namsai Forest Division, transferred to illegally operating saw-mills of Chowkham, where they are loaded in trucks and then after obtaining TP from Pasighat the said timber is then transferred to Assam from where it is sold to various parts of the country.
The forest officials of Pasighat were also examined and they have informed that the said TP’s were issued by them however the trucks and timber seized by police is not the same to the trucks against whom the Tp was issued indicating some kind of fraudulent act on the part of the mill owner and transporter.
SP also informed that the racket has been operating for quite some months now and they are presently evaluating the scope and nature of it.
