Mandya: A 45-year-old man, identified as Manjunath, was detained on Saturday by Cauvery Reserve Forest range forest officials for hunting four peahens and a peacock.

Manjunath was apparently planning to pass over the peafowls to his partners near Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary in Sathanur, on the outskirts of Bengaluru.

Officials have also confiscated a country-made rifle which Manjunath used for hunting. Villagers alerted Range Forest Officer Kiran Kumar, who later led a team and conducted a raid at Manjunath’s farm house.

Manjunath was arrested, but his accomplice, Muthanna, who also hunted the birds with him, managed to flee. Efforts are currently on, to nab Muthanna, who is on the run.
Manjunath is currently in judicial custody at Ramanagar prison and has been booked under various sections of the Wildlife Protection Act.

In another poaching instance, back in 2017, forest officials in Bhadra Tiger Reserve caught a group of youngsters who worked in software firms in Bengaluru trying to hunt a sambar deer inside the reserve.

The group of 12 was joined by locals while hunting with a licensed rifle. They had shot two sambar deer and were intending to take the meat for a New Year’s party.
They were caught red-handed in Thanigebailu Range of Bhadra Wildlife Division, Chikkamagaluru district.

Six of the accused were trained shooters and used to take part in several shooting competitions as well, said a forest official, who arrested them.
A majority of the accused were residents of Richmond Town and Austin Town in Bengaluru. Officers stated that the female deer which they had shot weighed 70 kgs, while the male deer weighed around 200 kgs.
All the accused were booked under various sections of the Indian Wildlife Act(Protection) 1972 and were taken in judicial custody.