Assam: DRI seizes 24 pieces of ivory at Guwahati railway station

The market value of the recovered ivory is around Rs 35 lakh.

Acting on specific information, the DRI team had intercepted the two persons at Guwahati railway station on Saturday evening.

The interception took place as the recipient of the ivory, Suraj Kumar Singh, a resident of West Bengal, was in the process of receiving the package from Badrul Hussain, a resident of Hojai district of Assam.

Singh, who is a contractual employee of Railways, works as a coach attendant in Saraighat Express.

During interrogation, the two persons revealed that Badrul Hussain had picked up the package containing ivory from a person at Hojai and was supposed to deliver it to Singh, who would have in turn delivered it to another person at New Jalpaiguri in West Bengal, further smuggling it to Nepal through the border townships at North Bengal.

It has been confirmed by the wildlife officials that the recovered tusks have been extracted after killing at least five adult and sub-adult elephants and since the ivory has been sourced from Hojai, it is believed that the elephants were in all likelihood killed in the Karbi Anglong district of Assam.

DRI had seized 12.410 kg of ivory from a bus at Siliguri on Feb 15, earlier this year.

(Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath)