Two police constables were arrested for allegedly being involved in illegal transportation of cattle in Udupi district on Tuesday night.
Superintendent of Police Nisha James told The Hindu that the two constables arrested were Santosh Shetty of Coastal Security Police and Vinod Gowda of Manki Police Station in Uttara Kannada.
Four more police personnel, including a gunman of the Additional Superintendent of Police and an Assistant Reserve Sub-Inspector, are involved in the racket of illegal transportation of cattle.
These four are absconding and the police are trying to trace them.
“The accused used to pass on information to cattle traffickers on whether the road was clear for transportation in exchange for money,” Ms. James said.
Tip-off
The incident came to light on July 12, when acting on a tip-off, a team from Kota Police Station apprehended a lorry carrying cattle illegally with a car following it near the Toll Plaza at Sasthan.
The accused, car driver Shivananda and another occupant in the car, Maruti Naik, lorry driver Sainuddin and the other occupants of the lorry, Ganeshan, Hameed C.H. and Sameer, were arrested by the police. The police also seized 20 buffalos, along with the car and the lorry.
Inquiry
During inquiry, the accused told the police that they were taking the 20 buffalos to Kasaragod in Kerala. They also said that some policemen were helping them in trafficking in cattle.
This blew the cover off the racket.
Of these six accused, who were in the seized lorry and the car, four have been remanded to police custody, the police said.