Officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DoRI) and Central Excise have seized about 50 tonnes of red sandalwood worth Rs10 crore from a godown in Jainapur village of the district.
Officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DoRI) and Central Excise have seized about 50 tonnes of red sandalwood worth Rs10 crore from a godown in Jainapur village of the district.
The officials have detained one person (name not disclosed) for questioning. They are apprehensive that the commodity was meant to be smuggled out of the country.
The raids by the two departments began on Tuesday and continued till Wednesday.
Cutting of red sandalwood is illegal as per the Indian Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, while its export is banned under the Indian Customs Act, 1962.
Kolhapur-based Additional Commissioner of Central Excise Uttamrao Jadhav told reporters that investigations were on to ascertain how the commodity was kept in that godown owned by one Nitin Chougle.
Apparently, Chougle had rented the godown to one Ravi Waykar a few months ago. Wayker had told Chougle that the godown would be used for making mango and guava pulp.
The information gathered so far by the officers points to the involvement of a big racket in the smuggling of red sandalwood.
According to the officials, they have found big cartons containing materials like garments, threads, etc, which were supposed to be exported. “Instead of sending the consignments for exports, they were redirected to the godown. There the materials were to be taken out from the cartons and replaced with red sandalwood before dispatching them for exports,” the officials said.
“We have also found a huge quantity of genuine export stuff... The total worth of these materials is being calculated,” Jadhav added.
The DoRI had recently arrested five persons in Mumbai in connection with red sandalwood smuggling. Their questioning apparently led the officials to the Kolhapur godown.
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