Animal skins, 40 guns recovered from national level shooter's residence

In a raid at the residence of a national level shooter in Uttar Pradesh's Meerut town that continued for over 17 hours, a joint team of Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) and forest department, recovered skins, carcasses and skulls of endangered and extinct animals, guns and a huge amount of cash.

According to the forest officials here on Sunday, around 117 kilograms of meat of 'Nilgai' (blue bull) and thousands of live cartridges were also recovered from the residence of Prashant Bishnoi, a national level shooter and his father, retired colonel Devindra Kumar.

Sources said that the raid, which started at dawn on Saturday, continued till the wee hours of Sunday. Officials said that ten horns of black bucks, sambhar, stuffed deer, knives made of ivory tusk, skins of leopard and other wild animals were found inside a godown in the house.

Besides as many as forty guns, including rifles and pistols, thousands of live cartridges, were also recovered from the godown along with Rs. one Crore in cash.
 

Forest officials suspected an international racket of poaching, wildlife hunting and arms smuggling. ''It seems to be a huge racket...it may have international connections,'' said an official.

Bishnoi had participated in last year's national championship and finished 65th. He has been designated as a national level shooter. The locals said that the house, situated at Civil Lines area in Meerut, was used mostly by Bishnoi. Devinder Kumar seldom visited the house, they told the officials.

Bishnoi was absconding and efforts were on to trace him. Sources said that a case under the Wildlife Protection Act was registered against the duo in this connection.