That poaching is an organised crime throughout India and not an impulse decision by some loafer who gets greedy is uncontestable. There are well defined gangs with their own territories. Vehicles, weapons and ammunition are in plenty. So is their protection from the local police who escort them to their destinations. They always have shrieky expensive lawyers, judges in the lower courts. Violence against law enforcement personnel is common. The markets are protected by local politicians and police and the Indian Forest service personnel who are probably the stupidest and most scared people in the country look the other way. In most cases they are not even considered worthy enough to bribe.
I was in Bareilly which forms part of my constituency Aonla, last week. On the way I received an SMS saying that if I was interested in stopping poachers from the jungles of Uttarakhand and Pilibhit/ Lakhimpur next door, I should pack up the huge bird markets in Bareilly. It gave me the details of the four biggest markets. As soon as I reached the Circuit House, I sent for the District Forest Officer, a plump pathetic obsequious creature typical of his tribe in Uttar Pradesh. Three predictable excuses: No birds are being sold; I have no place to keep confiscated birds; These poor people should be allowed to be criminals!! He came to life was when I told him I would ask the Crime Branch to investigate his assets since he was obviously involved with these criminals and scurried off with my team. In two hours they found 600 birds. How many people arrested? None. Why not? Because these were women. The women did not run away. On the contrary, they collected outside the police station and thumped their breasts and wailed till they were driven away. Imagine people being caught with stolen jewellery and TVs who collect before a police station to demand them back – and are driven away instead of being arrested!!!
In Amritsar recently, one of our Delhi socialites whose husband’s family owns the biggest medicine empire was caught with a suitcase of Shahtoosh shawls which she was taking for sale to London. Since she is Sikh and well connected, she immediately called upon Punjab politicians to get her off the hook which they did. She does this regularly. So does the millionaire mother of the ex- high flying cricket entrepreneur. In fact most of the wildlife smuggling that is done by airline passengers is done by women. According to the research done by CITES, international organised gangs use persons of “high political or social status” as their smugglers. CITES also says that the smugglers usually have previous convictions for other types of crime – both these women have been accused of crimes ranging from arson to insurance frauds and members of their family are regularly accused of tax fraud. Unfortunately they always get away and are welcomed back into the social circle. Thai Customs officials regularly catch high society women. Last month they caught two women dealers with ivory items worth millions disguised as toys and gifts. Last week a live tiger cub was found drugged and hidden among stuffed-tiger toys in the over sized luggage of a woman at Bangkok's airport.
Delhi has a woman called Moti who sits in Jama Masjid and sells every known form of wildlife article from birds to tigers. We have had her arrested more than 30 times. She is out the next day on bail – beating even the record of the notorious tiger skin smuggler Sansar Chand who is represented by the best lawyers. Why is she released? Because she is a woman. The fact that she is the face of a 300 member gang who bring in birds, snakes, cat claws, scorpions, mongooses etc. is irrelevant. She has never even been interrogated so her gang roams free.
When I caught the monitor lizard oil dealers in Badaun it was the women who had brought the lizards in from Rajasthan. When I stopped the buses from Pilibhit to inspect the luggage on the roof, it was women bringing in birds to Delhi. When we rounded the bird catching Bahelias in Pilibhit, we found their women running dhabas using servants (so much for how poor they are) and selling wild animal parts like leopard skins and live birds to truckers to take on to the cities.
In all the tribes that are doing nothing but poaching in India: the Bawarias who move as a family and are organised big cat hunters who operate in and around wildlife sanctuaries, the nomadic Pardhiis, the Narikauravas of South India who steal squirrels and domestic cats as well, the Kela tribes of Orissa who poach monitor lizards and sell their skins to the music industry … the women are partners in crime. If you see women selling cheap jewellery in temporary shops anywhere near a forest or sanctuary, you can be sure this is a hunting party whose men are already in the kill zone laying out their traps. At midnight the women and children will move in, after the forest guards are drunk and asleep (if they ever got up at all) and by late morning the animal is dead, skinned, the parts separated and the women and children are in the train to give them to the exporter who will send them on to China. These tribes kill leopards, bears and elephants for ivory, indulge in organised theft of railways and telecom properties, are into sandalwood smuggling while some do contract murders.
Women have long past the time when all they were caught for was prostitution or the murder of a spouse. Now, according to all studies on women criminals they are involved in everything from robberies to murder, drug smuggling, bomb making and gun running, wood smuggling to wildlife crime. According to a report in Uttar Pradesh’s prominent Hindi Daily ”Dainik Jagaran” on July 02, 2009 “Zaraim Ki Duniya Mein Mahilayein Bhi Kam Nahi Hai” (Women are as prominent in the world of crime ) female gangs operate in the trains by drugging railway passengers and then looting their possessions.
Police say that women voluntarily enter into crime for the money since most of them belong to families having a criminal background and find nothing wrong in their way of life. This, I have seen, applies to all the women in the wildlife trade.
Most police people refuse to recognise women in the wildlife trade as criminals and so they are never arrested or, if arrested under pressure from people like me, they are never remanded to custody. Our police need to understand that these women are habitual offenders and if let off today, will be back selling birds on the street the next day. They should be arrested is because they will destroy the evidence and they will warn their men who are still free. They should be arrested because they will abscond.
The police claim that arresting women is a nuisance as they bring their children with them, they have to all be fed, care has to be taken that female constables are around so that these women do not claim they have been raped, molested or abused. Searches of women can only be made by other women. Women police officers have to be associated where women are being arrested and no arrests of women between sunset and sunrise can be done. They have to be put in a separate lockup from the men. They have to be given free legal aid and a female requesting for medical help should be examined only by a female registered medical practitioner. They can only be interrogated by women.
So what? None of this is impossible to do. The women should be interrogated as they are the key to all the gangs. Interrogation must be consistent with the recognised rights to life, dignity and right against torture and degrading treatment. The women must be produced before the appropriate court within 24 hours of the arrest. But that does not mean that the police do not ask for remand. Crime is crime — irrespective of gender.
When will wildlife crime become a law enforcement priority? Banks and jewellery are covered by insurances and money stolen can be replaced. But once the leopard and owl is poached, it is gone forever. The illegal killing, the cross-border smuggling and the trade in natural resources bring profits that greatly exceed those acquired by criminals engaged in trafficking narcotics, humans or firearms. Every year, law enforcement officials combating such crimes lose their lives. Yet illegal activities targeting fauna and flora continue to be seen as petty misdemeanours.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
I was in Bareilly which forms part of my constituency Aonla, last week. On the way I received an SMS saying that if I was interested in stopping poachers from the jungles of Uttarakhand and Pilibhit/ Lakhimpur next door, I should pack up the huge bird markets in Bareilly. It gave me the details of the four biggest markets. As soon as I reached the Circuit House, I sent for the District Forest Officer, a plump pathetic obsequious creature typical of his tribe in Uttar Pradesh. Three predictable excuses: No birds are being sold; I have no place to keep confiscated birds; These poor people should be allowed to be criminals!! He came to life was when I told him I would ask the Crime Branch to investigate his assets since he was obviously involved with these criminals and scurried off with my team. In two hours they found 600 birds. How many people arrested? None. Why not? Because these were women. The women did not run away. On the contrary, they collected outside the police station and thumped their breasts and wailed till they were driven away. Imagine people being caught with stolen jewellery and TVs who collect before a police station to demand them back – and are driven away instead of being arrested!!!
In Amritsar recently, one of our Delhi socialites whose husband’s family owns the biggest medicine empire was caught with a suitcase of Shahtoosh shawls which she was taking for sale to London. Since she is Sikh and well connected, she immediately called upon Punjab politicians to get her off the hook which they did. She does this regularly. So does the millionaire mother of the ex- high flying cricket entrepreneur. In fact most of the wildlife smuggling that is done by airline passengers is done by women. According to the research done by CITES, international organised gangs use persons of “high political or social status” as their smugglers. CITES also says that the smugglers usually have previous convictions for other types of crime – both these women have been accused of crimes ranging from arson to insurance frauds and members of their family are regularly accused of tax fraud. Unfortunately they always get away and are welcomed back into the social circle. Thai Customs officials regularly catch high society women. Last month they caught two women dealers with ivory items worth millions disguised as toys and gifts. Last week a live tiger cub was found drugged and hidden among stuffed-tiger toys in the over sized luggage of a woman at Bangkok's airport.
Delhi has a woman called Moti who sits in Jama Masjid and sells every known form of wildlife article from birds to tigers. We have had her arrested more than 30 times. She is out the next day on bail – beating even the record of the notorious tiger skin smuggler Sansar Chand who is represented by the best lawyers. Why is she released? Because she is a woman. The fact that she is the face of a 300 member gang who bring in birds, snakes, cat claws, scorpions, mongooses etc. is irrelevant. She has never even been interrogated so her gang roams free.
When I caught the monitor lizard oil dealers in Badaun it was the women who had brought the lizards in from Rajasthan. When I stopped the buses from Pilibhit to inspect the luggage on the roof, it was women bringing in birds to Delhi. When we rounded the bird catching Bahelias in Pilibhit, we found their women running dhabas using servants (so much for how poor they are) and selling wild animal parts like leopard skins and live birds to truckers to take on to the cities.
In all the tribes that are doing nothing but poaching in India: the Bawarias who move as a family and are organised big cat hunters who operate in and around wildlife sanctuaries, the nomadic Pardhiis, the Narikauravas of South India who steal squirrels and domestic cats as well, the Kela tribes of Orissa who poach monitor lizards and sell their skins to the music industry … the women are partners in crime. If you see women selling cheap jewellery in temporary shops anywhere near a forest or sanctuary, you can be sure this is a hunting party whose men are already in the kill zone laying out their traps. At midnight the women and children will move in, after the forest guards are drunk and asleep (if they ever got up at all) and by late morning the animal is dead, skinned, the parts separated and the women and children are in the train to give them to the exporter who will send them on to China. These tribes kill leopards, bears and elephants for ivory, indulge in organised theft of railways and telecom properties, are into sandalwood smuggling while some do contract murders.
Women have long past the time when all they were caught for was prostitution or the murder of a spouse. Now, according to all studies on women criminals they are involved in everything from robberies to murder, drug smuggling, bomb making and gun running, wood smuggling to wildlife crime. According to a report in Uttar Pradesh’s prominent Hindi Daily ”Dainik Jagaran” on July 02, 2009 “Zaraim Ki Duniya Mein Mahilayein Bhi Kam Nahi Hai” (Women are as prominent in the world of crime ) female gangs operate in the trains by drugging railway passengers and then looting their possessions.
Police say that women voluntarily enter into crime for the money since most of them belong to families having a criminal background and find nothing wrong in their way of life. This, I have seen, applies to all the women in the wildlife trade.
Most police people refuse to recognise women in the wildlife trade as criminals and so they are never arrested or, if arrested under pressure from people like me, they are never remanded to custody. Our police need to understand that these women are habitual offenders and if let off today, will be back selling birds on the street the next day. They should be arrested is because they will destroy the evidence and they will warn their men who are still free. They should be arrested because they will abscond.
The police claim that arresting women is a nuisance as they bring their children with them, they have to all be fed, care has to be taken that female constables are around so that these women do not claim they have been raped, molested or abused. Searches of women can only be made by other women. Women police officers have to be associated where women are being arrested and no arrests of women between sunset and sunrise can be done. They have to be put in a separate lockup from the men. They have to be given free legal aid and a female requesting for medical help should be examined only by a female registered medical practitioner. They can only be interrogated by women.
So what? None of this is impossible to do. The women should be interrogated as they are the key to all the gangs. Interrogation must be consistent with the recognised rights to life, dignity and right against torture and degrading treatment. The women must be produced before the appropriate court within 24 hours of the arrest. But that does not mean that the police do not ask for remand. Crime is crime — irrespective of gender.
When will wildlife crime become a law enforcement priority? Banks and jewellery are covered by insurances and money stolen can be replaced. But once the leopard and owl is poached, it is gone forever. The illegal killing, the cross-border smuggling and the trade in natural resources bring profits that greatly exceed those acquired by criminals engaged in trafficking narcotics, humans or firearms. Every year, law enforcement officials combating such crimes lose their lives. Yet illegal activities targeting fauna and flora continue to be seen as petty misdemeanours.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.