PANAJI
Forest officials detained 16 employees of the State-owned Kadamba Transport Corporation Limited (KTCL) on suspicion of being on a hunting trip at Saljini in Netravali Wildlife Sanctuary.
Five live cartridges, a hatchet, an axe and cooking utensils have been seized from them.
The sixteen KTCL employees, including drivers and porters from the Sanguem area, were moving to Saljini in the Netravali sanctuary area in batches at around 9.30 pm on Saturday night.
Their movements alerted the forest department officials on duty leading them to suspect that the group was headed to the sanctuary to hunt wild animals and then hold a party.
A forest department team was then in hot pursuit of the suspected hunting party and detained 16 persons. Two others succeeded in escaping, the forest officials suspect.
From those detained, the forest officials recovered five live cartridges, a hatchet, an axe and utensils like cups, plates, etc, besides cooking utensils.
However, hunting guns are yet to be recovered by the forest department team.
The group was brought to the Netravali office of the wildlife division late at night and a case was registered against them under the Wildlife Protection Act.
The Forest department said that the search for the other two who escaped is still on.
RFO Devidas Varip posted at the Netravali Wildlife Sanctuary, is investigating the case and he is being assisted by Assistant Forester Damodar Salelkar.
Meanwhile, incidents of poaching wild animals at night are seemingly on the rise in Saljini and nearby areas of the sanctuary.
Night patrolling and some other measures are regularly being carried out, officials said, but in the last few years, such hunting expeditions are suspected to be happening frequently.
