Four held for poaching porcupine

By Rabindra Upreti,Bardibas, Aug. 16: Four individuals have been arrested from the Lakshminiya forest in Bardibas-10 with six dead porcupines, called dumsi in Nepali, which they had hunted illegally.

According to forest officials, those arrested are Arun Mistri, Ramswarup Mistri, Umesh Mistri and Dhruv Mistri, all residents of Bhaktipurnath Tole, Ishwarpur-3, Sarlahi.

Santosh Jha, Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) of Sarlahi, said he stopped the suspects at around 8:30 pm on Wednesday night when he was travelling from Janakpur towards Lalbandi. 

The team seized two plastic sacks containing six dead porcupines, along with homemade hunting weapons, from their motorcycles -- registration numbers Ba 88 Pa 1160 and Ba 56 Pa 2240 -- during a check in Lakshminiya forest.

“This was an unexpected incident for us, as we caught people travelling on the road with wild animals,” Jha said. Since the animals were seized in a forest area of Mahottari, the four suspects, along with the motorcycles and carcasses, were handed over that night to the Sub-Division Forest Office in the same area.

The suspects are now being held at the Armed Forest Security Unit in Bardibas-4, Maimaisthan.

The four claimed that they did not hunt the animals in the forest but in farmland in Haripur, located in eastern Mahendranagar, Dhanusha district. They said they hunted the porcupines at around 4 pm on Wednesday near a bamboo grove beside a maize field, using their hunting dogs and homemade weapons, at the request of farmers whose crops were damaged by the animals.

“We killed the porcupines ourselves, but not in the forest -- only in the fields,” all four said. “Because it rained all day, we were delayed in returning to our homes in Bhaktipur, Sarlahi. While passing through Lakshminiya forest, we were caught, and this made the authorities think we had hunted in the jungle.”

According to Krishna Kumar Patel and Sikindar Chaudhary, Chiefs of the Maimaisthan Sub-Division Forest Office, the porcupine is not a protected species. However, hunting without following the legal procedure is against the Forest Act.

“If wild animals cause damage outside the forest, in settlements or farmland, they can be killed or controlled only by paying the prescribed royalty and following the legal process,” they said. “No one is allowed to kill them in their interest. That is why preparations are being made to take action against all four arrested men.”