Kupwara, Sep 8: Police has started a drive against the timber smugglers in Kupwara district by registering around 50 cases against those involved in the act from the last one year.
 Considered as a grave crime, felling of green trees is going on unabated in the Kupwara forest areas.
 Police says that some of the lower rung Forest department officials have allegedly given a free hand to the timber smugglers to plunder the green gold.
 According to police data, 49 cases of timber smuggling were registered from August 2011 till this date. Most of cases, data says have been registered in jurisdictions of police stations of Lolab and Natnoosa area.
 “While investigating these cases, we have arrested 34 persons that included some officials of Forest department,” a senior police official in Kupwara told Greater Kashmir. “All of them were bailed out by the different Courts,” he added.
 The officer said that 18 accused have so far been charge sheeted. “In the rest of the cases, the investigations are on,” he said.
 The police official said the locals now inform the policemen about the felling of green trees and timber smuggling. “On the information of locals of different areas, we have been able to arrest the people red handed while they were felling the trees and smuggling timber,” he said.
 “We have launched a drive against the timber smuggling and felling of green trees across the district and every police station in district has been ordered to act swiftly once there is information about plundering of green gold,” the police official added.
 He said in most of the cases, an alleged nexus between the smugglers and lower rung Forest officials have been found. “Recently we detected a band saw mill functioning from a range office,” the official said.
 He said at some places the Forest officials were attacked by smugglers. The official said that in January this year, seven forest officials were injured when a group of timber smugglers attacked them in Kandi range of Kamraj forest Division in Natnoosa. “They were attacked when they raided a compartment. A group of smugglers attacked the officials with sharp edged weapons injuring seven of them,” he said adding police investigations later revealed that 21 timber smugglers of the area were involved in the act. “We will continue our drive to check timber smuggling in the area,” the official said.

Lastupdate on : Sat, 8 Sep 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Sat, 8 Sep 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sun, 9 Sep 2012 00:00:00 IST