Rhino poacher killed in firing while trying to flee in Chirang district

CHIRANG: A rhino poacher was killed in firing in Chirang district along the Indo-Bhutan border on Monday morning as he attacked police personnel and tried to flee from police custody, officials said. Special Task Force (STF) officials said that the accused identified as Naweswar Basumutary was killed in firing in self-defence by the police.

DIG Partha Sarathi Mahanta said that in a joint operation, STF, Chirang district police and the forest department, three rhino poachers were arrested.

“Early today morning, when a police team took one of the three arrested poachers to a location along the Indo-Bhutan border where some weapons were kept hidden, the arrested poacher attacked police personnel and tried to flee from the area. The poacher was killed after police personnel fired upon him in self-defence,” DIG Mahanta said. Pranjit Borah, Superintendent of Police, Chirang District has said that it is a seven-member group out of which three were arrested.

“On August 12, three poachers were apprehended during a joint operation of police and forest department. A 7-member poacher group camped six days in the Baksa district in April this year and killed a rhino in Manas National Park, and later sold the rhino horn outside of the state. We arrested three among the 7-member group and also recovered one firearm.”

“Yesterday on August 13, we formed three separate groups and took the arrested poachers to find out the location of other members of the group and to recover arms. One of our teams took Naweswar Basumutary to search for arms in the Malibhita area. When our team reached the spot nearby a river, he attacked police personnel by using a sharp weapon that was kept hidden at the location. In self-defence, police fired upon him and he received bullet injuries. We immediately rushed him to the hospital, but the doctors declared him dead,” Chirang SP said. He further said that a police investigation is on and we are continuing our operation to nab the absconding other poachers. (ANI)

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