It was an emotional moment and a major sense of relief for several forest officials on Sunday, watching a few months old baby pangolin holding on tight to its mother's tail as they were released into their natural habitat. Had it not been for the combined efforts of the staff from Yeoor range, Thane territorial and Sudhagadh range — both the mother and baby would have been poached for their meat and scales.

An operation that began with a tip-off and ran for about 10 days ended up with eight people including a woman being arrested for trafficking and trying to sell a live pair of a mother and baby pangolin. The arrests were made on Saturday by Sudhagadh range forest officials and all the accused have been booked under different sections of Wildlife Protection Act 1972.

It was Range Forest Officer (RFO) Rajendra Pawar from Yeoor Range who first received a tip-off about some people trying to trade live pangolins after which he began his investigations.

"Photographs of the baby pangolin moved me so much that I resolved to try and do everything to save them. We managed to get one accused by posing as a potential buyer," said Pawar adding that the accused asked them to meet on Pali Wakan road on Mumbai Goa highway.

Pawar immediately alerted Deputy Conservator of Forest (DCF) Thane territorial, Dr Jitendra Ramgaonkar as well as officials from Sudhagad range for the joint operation.

Sameer Shinde, RFO, Sudhagadh range said that they set up a trap on Saturday evening and managed to nab three accused first and seized the pangolins, which were stuffed in a jute gunny bag. "We realised that there were more people involved and soon we managed to nab a total of eight people and seized one four wheeler and a two-wheeler," said Shinde adding that since the pangolins were fit to be released, they decided to get permissions from the court on priority basis and released the duo on Sunday.

Shinde informed that with the court granting the forest department custody of all the accused till May 9, detailed interrogation of the accused was being carried out. "It's suspected that the pangolin has been brought from Konkan belt. We are trying to find the link of how and where it was brought and also investigating to get details if the accused are connected to the trafficking network," he informed.