Absconding khair wood smuggler held

PONDA: Continuing with their investigations into the smuggling of khair wood at Palwada-Usgao, Ponda forest officials on Friday arrested Dulo Kokre, who had been evading arrest over the past week. Kokre had managed to escape even as foresters arrested six people in connection with the case.

Although the crime was discovered early this month, the Ponda forest unit announced it only on Friday after Kokre’s arrest. In the interim, the team had seized 3.62 cubic metres of illegally felled khair (Acacia catechu) trees estimated to be worth around Rs 2.5 lakh and had arrested Mahesh Gaonkar, Gurunath Gaude, Pradip Jadhav, Mangesh Tendulkar, Sanjay Tendulkar and Ramchandra Patkar, all residents of Nerwade-Sawantwadi, Maharashtra, while they were loading the wood in the van. Kokre had managed to flee the site and was absconding till his arrest on Friday.

The six men were later released on bail.

The raid was conducted under the guidance of the Ponda deputy conservator of forests Kuldeep Sharma, and assistant forest conservator Anand Jadhav. The raiding team comprised range forest officers Deepak Betkikar and Prajyot Naik, and forest guards Devu Shetkar, Sachin Sawant, Rajan Gaonkar, Akshay Gauns, Deepa Redkar, Kiran Salgaonkar, Rama Dergunkar, Prajyot Desai, Shashank Arsekar, Kamlakant Kurtikar, Babi Gaonkar and Ali Shaikh.

Khair is a forest produce according to the Indian Forest Act, 1927, whose illegal felling and transportation is a criminal offence.