NEW DELHI: The Crime Branch of the Delhi Police last week claimed that it had bust a smuggling racket of Royal Bengal tiger skins with the arrest of five people from south Delhi. It said that two such skins had been seized from the smugglers, which, a senior official had contended, would have fetched them Rs 20 lakh apiece.
On Tuesday, the official of a Central wildlife agency, however, told TNIE on the condition of anonymity that one of the seized skins did not, in all likelihood, belong to a tiger at all, while the second skin was still being examined by experts.“Preliminary examination of one such skin has revealed that it belongs to an animal, but not a tiger. It is probably that of a dog.
It seems that stripes were painted on it to make it resemble a tiger skin,” he said. According to the source, the city police had sent both the seized skins to the Dehradun-based Wildlife Institute of India (WII) for their expert opinion on their origin, where the ‘forgery’ had come to light.
He explained that the stripes on a tiger’s skin are vertical and range in colour from brown to black, which help the big cat blend in with foliage in the wild. They are, however, not symmetrical, as is the case in the one of the recovered animal skins.
The WII is, however, yet to give a final official report in the matter. The examination of the second skin is still underway and it may well turn out to have belonged to a tiger, he said. The source added that the smugglers caught by the police too were probably unaware that they were ferrying a ‘fake’ tiger skin.
Speaking to this newspaper, DCP (Crime Branch) Amit Goel confirmed that the seized animal skins were sent to the WII, which is yet to submit a final report to them.
“When the animal skins were seized, we had called in wildlife department officials and they had given an opinion after a preliminary examination that they belonged to tigers. However, we sent them to the WII and their report is awaited. We can comment officially only after that is received,” he said.
Cops claimed big success
Delhi Police Crime Branch said last week it arrested 5 people in the smuggling of tiger skins. A senior official went to the extent of claiming that the hides could have brought Rs 20 lakh on each piece.