BENGALURU: A travel agent has been arrested by the Hanumanthanagar police in Bengaluru for smuggling 23 kilos of pangolin scales. The scales were seized and search is on to trace three other involved in the case.
Upon receiving a tip-off, the police flung into action and caught the travel agent identified as Kiran Ramnaik, while he was waiting to hand over the pangolin scales near PES College.
The police said that Ramnaik, a resident of Hasiguli village in Siddapura of Uttara Kannada district, was only acting as a courier while the poaching had been done by others at Siddapura.
While the arrested confessed to the police that a kilo of pangolin scale would fetch Rs 1 lakh in the market, the police are yet to ascertain as to where the scales were meant to be transported from Bengaluru. It is suspected that the scales, which are used in making medicines and cosmetics, are smuggled to China or an African country.
The police have booked him under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972.
