Guest guest Posted November 18, 2002 Report Share Posted November 18, 2002 Illegal wildlife trade runs away from city. By Saurabh Sinha. 11/19/2002 The Times of India © 2002 Times of India Group. All rights reserved. NEW DELHI: With the Delhi state government and law enforcing agencies cracking down on illegal trade of wildlife products, poachers and tra-ders are shifting shop outside the city. Delhi is now being used to strike deals, while the products - including animal skins, ivory and shahtoosh shawls - are being delivered mostly outside, say wildlife officials. " Deals are still struck here. But a majority of the products may be delivered near wildlife sanctuaries, international borders or hill areas, " said assistant commissioner of police (special cell) L N Rao. Last year, the state wildlife department posted a senior official to coordinate fulltime with agencies concerned and neighbouring state governments to clamp down on the illegal trade. " We registered a record 31 cases last year. Five tiger skins, 23 leopard skins, 89 shahtoosh shawls, 32.6 kg ivory and 2,555 protected birds were seized, " said wildlife officer Bipin Behari. Ashok Kumar of Wildlife Trust of India claims stepped-up cooperation between the wildlife department, the police and Central Bureau of Investigation has made poachers wary. " While illegal killing has not stopped, the trade is shifting out of the city, " Kumar said. Behari said just nine cases of animal skin and bird seizures have been registered in the city so far this year. " But several such seizures have been reported outside Delhi in places like Haldwani, " said Delhi's chief wildlife warden S S Garbyal. " Last week, we received information that a large consignment of shahtoosh shawls would be coming to Delhi from Kashmir, " said Behari. " When we conducted a raid, we found just 11 shawls. The rest had been distributed before entering the city. Earlier, the entire lot would have reached Delhi for a better price, " he said. Rao said coordinating with the special cell had helped curb the trade, since it had better sources of information. " Also, the local police is overworked, " he said. The chief wildlife warden said the department had asked the Centre to set up a joint team of wildlife wardens of different states to clamp down effectively on the trade. Folder Name: Asia Conservation Leopard Relevance Score on Scale of 100: 84 ____________________ To review or revise your folder, visit http://www.djinteractive.com or contact Dow Jones Customer Service by e-mail at custom.news or by phone at 800-369-7466. (Outside the U.S. and Canada, call 609-452-1511 or contact your local sales representative.) ____________________ Copyright © 2002 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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