Dhaka Metropolitan Detective Branch (DB) police have arrested two active members of a wildlife trafficking gang and rescued eight endangered mukhpora langurs from the Jatrabari area of the capital.

The arrested are Md Rafiqul Islam (43) and Md Rabiul Islam Sohag (30).

The DB's Wari division arrested them in a raid at the Kajla Bridge area of Jatrabari at dawn on Wednesday (8 January).

Muhammad Talebur Rahman, deputy commissioner (DC) of the DMP's Media and Public Relations Division, said police received a tip-off that members of a trafficking gang were passing through Jatrabari to smuggle some endangered wild animals. Acting on this, the raid was carried out at Kajla Bridge, where the eight endangered langurs were rescued and the two gang members arrested.

The arrested are active members of an organised wildlife trafficking ring. During initial questioning they admitted they had collected the endangered langurs from the hill areas of Chattogram and were taking them to be smuggled across the Satkhira border.

DC Talebur Rahman said that when the arrested were produced before a mobile court, the executive magistrate fined them Tk 6,000 and sentenced them to 21 days in jail under sections 3(1) and 12(1), as well as sections 34(kha) and 39, of the Wildlife Conservation Act 2012, with a further seven days in jail if the fine is not paid.

The rescued langurs were handed over through the proper process to the Wildlife Crime Control Unit of the Forest Department, the DMP official said.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.