GUWAHATI: Assam Police (border wing) and Kamrup Police seized 88 cattle from three heavy trucks (12-wheelers and 14-wheelers) from Amingaon on the northern bank of Brahmaputra on Tuesday. One of the drivers of the trucks - identified as Md Samin Ali of Kokrajhar - was successfully nabbed while the others managed to flee. Two other trucks carrying cattle also broke through a police barricade and fled.Superintendent of police (border) Mukul Saikia told TOI, "All the five trucks were laden with cattle and coming from Assam. The trucks were on their way to Dawki in Meghalaya, from where these cattle would have been sent to Bangladesh." The smugglers were bringing the cattle from West Bengal , Haryana, Bihar as well as Nepal, he added.Preliminary investigations has revealed that agents based out of Dhubri in lower Assam, Meghalaya and in the city were operating the cattling smuggling rackets. The five trucks were going to the Meghalaya-Bangladesh border under cover of darkness and rain."Each of the cows were planned to be sold for around Rs 2 lakh. The total value of the seized cattle would be around Rs 1.76 crore," the SP informed.Cattle smuggling has been on a constant rise in the bordering areas of Dhubir and Mankachar sections of the state. Earlier, BSF as well as border police sources said cattle smugglers have been devising new methods of sending cattle to Bangladesh to be used for food and the leather industry there."As the border fencing has been undergoing upgrades from time to time, the cattle smugglers started to adopt other strategies such as engaging snorkellers, usually children, who use the hollow of papaya stems to breathe underwater and steer the cattle across through rivers flowing into Bangladesh," added the sources. Bamboo cranes are reportedly used in another technique. This entails tying a bamboo horizontally on a sturdy bamboo pole such that it swivels. Bangladeshi agents lower one end of the bamboo across the fence for their Indian associates to hang a cow, which is then swung up and across the fence to the other side.Illegal cross-border trade of cattle in the area is said to be worth Rs 5,000 crore annually.

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