TRICHY: As many as 24 monkeys, six of them female, were found dead on a vacant piece of land near Trichy-Chennai NH on Sunday morning. Forest officials said the cause of deaths is being investigated.
According to the officials, they got an alert that carcasses of monkeys were lying on a vacant land and an agriculture field near the reserve forest at Nedungur village in Trichy district.
A team of officials led by forest ranger Gopinath rushed to the spot and found 24 dead monkeys on the land. All of them were two years old. Initial investigations suggested that the deaths were not due to poisoning. They might have died due to suffocation, the forest ranger said.
“The perpetrators might have confined the animals in a small cage leaving them dead. However, the actual reason of death will be known only after getting the postmortem report,” Gopinath said.
Special teams have been formed to probe the incident and nab the culprits involved, officials said. After performing the postmortem, carcasses of all the 24 animals were buried inside the reserve forest range of Nedungur, forest officials said.
In a separate incident, forest officials seized five small pieces of elephant tusks from two people. The tusks were all carved to looks like tiger nails measuring 3cm in length and 1.5cm width.
The officials arrested Arupandi and Soundarrajan of Devarayanery in Trichy in connection with the incident. They have been handed over to the higher officials, officials said.
