“We have to make sure that all possible intelligence about the factories should be gathered in finer details with precision to ensure that we do not spare any of the targets. This operation must have surprise, stealth, and silence”, said H V Girish IFS while briefing the recce team. The team was about to embark on the final scouting of the infamous Mongoose hair brush manufacturing units in Sherkote- a town in Uttar Pradesh, known for its well-established illegal mongoose hair brush industry since 2002.
Like an army operation, this meeting was conducted with every aspect strategically planned with a mix of enforcement officials and handpicked volunteers. “Operation Clean Art” of the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau was on.
Since 2002, every year there were seizures of mongoose hair from various parts of the country where forest officials recovered both large and small quantities of brushes after receiving tip-offs from buyers. A major raid in 2018 to disrupt the factories in Sherkote ended up with partial success as the team managed to recover 54000 brushes and 150 kgs of hair from a single factory but could not raid other factories. The brush mafia thwarted many earlier attempts through various means including information leaks through well-placed assets which could warn operation initiatives by enforcement agencies. The geography of Sherkote also helped them as any unusual movement of police, forest vehicles were alerted well in advance by the informers and the factories were closed down and hair and brushes were moved to nearby homes where a search was impossible.
Operation Clean Art was conceived by WCCB with a single aim – to ensure that the mongoose hair brush trade should be closed down across the country. It was an ambitious plan because in one stroke, the brush business may not get erased. Learnings from the past, advanced intelligence tools and a large network of undercover operatives, mostly volunteers fanned out across the country posing as buyers. The leads were centrally monitored at the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau HQ, and gradually the plan was falling in place over one year so that a multi-layered operation can take place
The final operation was led by HV Girish of WCCB and the DFO of Bijnor – Mr. Semmaran, IFS where the state police and forest department personal participated. A team from WTI assisted the officials in the operation in multiple capacities. Another team was set up in Maharashtra were also WTI volunteers assisted the officials. It was decided that this time all the operations will happen simultaneously in multiple states. The teams were ready in four states – Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, and Kerala to conduct raids where actionable intelligence was in place.
The plans were kept secret and not even the participating staff was aware of the operation till the final briefing session. The forest staff were called from various divisions for official meeting purpose and the actual mission was revealed to them on arrival at the meeting point. Police assistance was managed through the SP office of Bijnor and by the time the debriefing started, there were more than a hundred participating team members present and multiple backup teams ready.
Ten targets were assigned to ten teams well prepared for the operation with clearly defined roles, equipped with recording devices, evidence collection kits, and search warrants issued by the authorised officials. There was armed police personal in each team to ensure security and women officials to ensure peaceful and proper search operations. There was technical surveillance to monitor crowd movement and deeply placed assets were supplying live information about the activities at the target. The operation was nothing less than a well-planned surgical strike coordinated by WCCB.
The instructions were clear, targets were mapped with GPS locations, each team had a person who had done a thorough recce of the location with exact entry and exit routes and the police were ready to provide backup support and ensure law and order. The entry was silent into the city and the officials were inside their targets before anyone could get an alert about the movement of vehicles. The teams acted as per the instructions and within minutes of the operation, there were updates about the recovery of goods and identification of suspects.
Brushes or hair stocks were found at each of the targets and some of the repeat offenders were in the middle of the manufacturing process. A few teams recovered cartons packed and ready for dispatch. At one location a prime suspect managed to escape through an underground passage, leaving his mobile phone, wallet and even his footwear. While the raiding teams were on their job, the state police officials ensured law and order across the town. Most of the households are connected with the brush industry and closure of a factory even for a few weeks does not bode well.
“When people are directly or indirectly involved in a form of crime and they earn money from the proceedings of the crime, there should be some punishment to discourage them from supporting the illegal business, let them make synthetic brushes and earn their living. we should not close our eyes to wildlife crime because it will affect livelihood of a few people,”. The senior official of WCCB was loud and clear when the concern of livelihood came up in an earlier discussion.
The raid was over within two hours and the materials and suspects were taken to the local police station for further procedures where the local forest officials completed the formalities. The raid and recovery was the beginning of documentation and other proceedings, At the end of the day Sherkot alone had 26000 brushes and 113 kilos of raw mongoose hair in the official custody with 26 people arrested in connection with the illegal trade in mongoose hair. Reports came in from all other locations with the Mumbai team recovering 30000 brushes – an unexpectedly large haul. The entire operation yielded 54352 Brushes, 113 raw hair, and 46 arrests.
Part One of Operation Clean Art concluded causing severe damage to the illegal trade in Mongoose hair brushes with makers and sellers behind bars. The game continues with overt operations where the consumers of these brushes will be educated using multiple mediums to ensure that the demand is reduced all over the country. This is more challenging as the buyers are in thousands all over the country and some of them are hard-core users of these brushes and they still don’t think that the brushes have a blood-stained origin.
Remember Riki Tiki Tawi from the stories of Rudyard Kipling? It’s time to help the lesser-known mongoose from a brush with death!
You can be part of this mission – via a direct call or WhatsApp to 9027640789 to receive some awareness material which can be used. If you find anyone selling these brushes, then please share the information through the above contacts so that action can be taken against the culprits. This trade can be stopped only through such coordinated efforts of people like you who care for nature and wildlife.
| Box: Blood on your paintbrush? |
| Since 2002, when the first seizures of mongoose hair brushes happened, this small town from Uttar Pradesh state – Sherkote used to pop up as the source of these brushes. Like any other small town of the state, with narrow roads flanked by buildings on each side, Sherkote’s claim to fame lay in its status as the central manufacturing hub of paintbrushes of all types and sizes. Its well-established network of suppliers and dealers facilitated business and employment for hundreds of people directly or indirectly in the brush industry. It was in the early 2000s that the secret behind the ‘salt n pepper’ brushes threw light on the illegal trade in mongoose hair – an animal currently protected under Schedule II, Part 2 of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.
In 2001, the mongoose was protected under Schedule IV where the punishment was much lower – the case could be compounded with a small fine which was less than the price of a hundred brushes. The cases were weak due to poor documentation and the case was about the sale of hair from a wild animal which is found commonly found in the country. A smart defense lawyer could convince the judicial officers that the tribal people collect the hair from dens of mongoose where they find a lot of shed hair. The courts were kind enough and the accused were freed after paying a fine in few cases while most of the cases were dismissed because there was not enough evidence to prove that the accused is guilty. The punishment was not good enough to stop the crime, and the profit from the trade was lucrative – a perfect ground for wildlife crime to flourish where the demand for its derivative was from all over the world.
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| Mongoose entered Schedule II Part 2 of the Wildlife Protection Act after some sustained efforts of conservationists which was led by Late Ashok Kumar who also assisted the enforcement officials with information about mongoose hair brush sellers from many parts of the country. Despite offences under Schedule II Part 2 attracting severe punishment – up to seven years in jail and hefty fines-there is not a single judgment till date where a person served a jail sentence for seven years for selling mongoose hair brushes. Most of the cases are still pending in the court. It is majorly because the mongoose hair trade is not as shocking as the trade of skin of tiger or horn of a rhino. Sadly, the lesser charismatic species do not attract public attention even when thousands of them are killed for their hair. |
2018 – 16 seizures, 79021 brushes, 165 kgs of Hair, 19 people arrested
2017 – 15 seizures, 62924 brushes, 23 arrests
About the Author: Jose, fondly known as crime buster Jose, heads the Wildlife Crime Control Division at WTI.
