152 endangered turtles, found 50 km from Digha, died during trafficking; two arrested

Heap of endangered turtles, found dead in an outfall canal last Wednesday at Medinipur around 50 km away from Digha and initially believed to have killed by toxic effluent released by adjacent rice mill, were actually thrown into the canal by traffickers when the animals died in transit; claimed local police on Friday evening after arresting two alleged traffickers.

According to local police, they raided the house of one of the traffickers, located in nearby Alua village and few kilometres away from from Balageria – Hatiari canal where the dead turtles were found, jointly with forest department after receiving a local tip off; and found more dead turtles either being buried recently or kept in a water container. Swapan Nayek and Durga Shankar Manna were arrested for being involved in crime; which, if proved, can lead to 3 to 7 years jail for the offenders under wild life protection act. According to forest department sources, Durga Shankar, who was earlier caught for similar crime, may even get a tougher penalty for being a repeat offender.

According to Biswajit Roy Chowdhury, a wild life expert and member of state wild life board, with whom The Plurals shared the photograph of dead turtles found on Friday, identified one of the samples as narrow-headed soft-shelled turtle – Chitra Indica being the scientific name – which is not only endangered as per national wild life protection act but also being part of IUCN Red List of threatened species.

The dead animals found in canal and also buried have been identified as flap shell turtle, that falls under schedule 1 category under the national wild life protection act which covers endangered species requiring rigorous protection; though not in IUCN list. The act also specifies that the animals falling under the act are granted protection from poaching, killing, trading etc.

“After a tip off we raided the house of Nayek and found 53 more turtles being buried while another four were found dead in a container. The offenders admitted that they trafficked the turtles from Orissa in late night of June 11, and had plans to sell them off on next morning. However, for some reasons, the turtles could not be sold off and died; and they threw part of it in the canal and buried rest close to their house” said Rajib Kundu, officer in charge of local Marishda police station to The Plurals. Though Manna and Nayek, according to police, claimed that they brought the turtles for supplying in local markets across the state; forest department sources are not ruling out the offenders being part of a wider and bigger conspiracy.

“So far, we got about 95 turtles from the canal, another 57 from their house; there could be even more, and lot of money seems to be involved. It seems hard to believe that one or two persons could do this unless they happen to be part of a much bigger inter-state trafficking network”, said a forest department official.

“We had an inkling before that some foul play might have been involved; as it is quite unlikely to get so many similar size turtles in one place” pointed out a senior forest department official to this reporter on Saturday.

“It felt bizarre that so many turtles died in a heap and did not try to get into the land; in case of a toxic exposure” added H S Debnath, state biodiversity board chairman; who first got information about the mass death of turtles from a member of a local biodiversity management committee.

“The effluent from the Sitama rice mill, near which the turtles were found dead, may not be directly responsible for the killing of the turtles; but that does not absolve its responsibility of releasing waste water as per norm. The unit has long been releasing foul water in the canal and we demand the state pollution control board and other authorities to take immediate action against the rice mill” said a few locals to this reporter.