BENGALURU: Soon, you may spot Caesar hard at work at the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA). The two-year-old female labrador, originally from Haryana, will nab smugglers and keep a check on smuggling of wildlife contraband.
Caesar was brought by the Karnataka Forest Department (KFD) to Madhya Pradesh, where she was checked and approved by the Border Security Force Academy in Gwalior. After Caesar was approved, she received training for nine months to become one of the sniffer dogs at KIA.
The KFD decided to bring a sniffer dog on board after many an instance of poaching and theft of sandalwood trees. “Rare products like sandalwood, red sanders, skin of animals and even teak wood are found to be smuggled to other countries,” said a senior KFD official.
According to the norms of the Border Security Force Academy, the training for dogs begins between the ages of six to nine months and that is when Caesar was trained too. “She has been trained to identify forest products and animals by their smell. Caesar is extremely active and can identify smuggled material instantly. She has a handler from KFD and has been taught to follow all his instructions,” the official said.
After Caesar’s training at the academy in Gwalior, she was brought to KFD six months ago where she was under acclimatisation. “Caesar had to get used to this environment. Even here in the forest she kept checking on any poachers or smugglers too. She was acclimatised to the forest products too, especially Red Sanders,” said the official.
While Caesar is all ready for her job at KIA, the formalities are taking a long time. “We are in talks with the KIA frequently and there are some legal formalities being done from both ends. They should even give necessary space to Caesar, which the KIA will work on and then she will be sent to nab smugglers,” said the official.
The official also pointed out that they want to work on getting more dogs to undergo training and use it at airports for security purposes.