Transportation and selling of wildlife articles, such as the skins of tigers and leopards, is still being carried out in the state, despite being pronounced illegal. The Karnataka High Court on Thursday heard the bail petition of two persons accused of buying leopard nails. They were granted conditional bail. On February 16, four persons were arrested while trying to transport tiger and leopard skins in an auto-rickshaw from the Balehonnur forest range.
One of the arrested men, Manjunath, had confessed that a female leopard had been killed by electrifying his cattle shed. The animal was then skinned and the nails removed. He sold two nails of the leopard to Ashok S. and Girish N. Accordingly, officers seized one leopard nail from each of the two accused and they were arrested and sent to judicial custody.
Both the Magistrate and Sessions Court rejected the bail application of the two men who are charged under Sec 2(16) of the Wildlife Protection Act (hunting by means of electrocuting), Sec 9 (prohibition of hunting any wild animal), Sec 39 (trading of wild animal), Sec 50 (c) (seizing any captive animal, wild animal, animal article), Sec 51 (penalties for violations of the Act) and Sec 55 (lodging of complaint in the court).
Justice K.N. Keshavanarayana, after hearing the arguments, granted bail to the two accused on the ground that the allegations of killing the tiger and leopard is against four others, that the skins were recovered from the others and not from these two, who are only accused of buying the nails. “They are entitled for bail after executing a personal bond of Rs 50,000 each with two sureties for the like sum to the satisfaction of the Magistrate," the court ordered.