KOCHI: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has filed a prosecution complaint (chargesheet) at a court in Kochi concerning the highly publicised Edamalayar elephant poaching case.
The investigation, which is now complete, has led to the prosecution of five individuals, including a trader and agents involved in the ivory business, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The accused mentioned in the prosecution complaint filed in the PMLA special court are Ajith Agarwal from New Delhi, and Thiruvananthapuram natives Aji Bright, Rajan alias Eagler Rajan, and Preeston Silva, who were agents in the ivory business.ED has also frozen the assets of the accused under the provisions in the PMLA.
ED’s Kochi unit began the investigation based on a case initiated by the Kerala Forest Department in 2016, with a primary focus on tracking the money laundering aspect of the case, which involved New Delhi-based ivory artefacts trader Umesh Agarwal and his suppliers in Kerala.
It has emerged that the ivory trader was laundering money through the sale of ivory artefacts. The official also added, “We have also identified hawala links of the accused in the case.” The Edamalayar elephant poaching case revolves around the illegal killing of 16 wild elephants for ivory that took place between 2013 and 2015 in forests of Kerala.
A gang led by Aikkaramuttam Vasu was involved in this barbaric activity, supplying ivory for illegal trade, some of which was even smuggled abroad.
The revelation of this atrocious crime came to light in 2015 when a former forest watcher-turned-poacher confessed to the elephant killings to Forest officials.The Forest Department suspects that more than 40 elephants had fallen victim to these notorious poachers.
An ED official further elaborated, “The poacher Vasu passed away in 2015. Vasu supplied ivory to Aji, Rajan, and Preeston, who acted as middlemen. These middlemen engaged artisans to create ivory artefacts, which were then supplied to traders in Mumbai, New Delhi, and Kolkata for sale.”