MYSURU: Police forces, including the Internal Security Division (ISD), are on high alert after it was found that a call was made via satellite phone - the use of which is banned in India - in the Gopinatham Range in the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary around a week ago.The call was placed near a temple on the banks of the Cauvery on the Karnataka-Tamil Nadu border, according to police sources. A couple of months ago, authorities found that a call was made by a satphone in the Bandipur National Park.
Chamarajanagar SP Anand Kumar confirmed that a satphone was used within MM Hills police station limits. He said the ISD and other agencies are investigating the call. Senior police officers have visited the spot and instructions have been issued to step up patrolling and intelligence gathering in the region and the villages in the area.
A senior officer told The New Indian Express that several agencies are coordinating the investigation as it is difficult for the local police to patrol 3,000 square kilometre of forests divided into the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary, the MM Hills Sanctuary and the Bandipur National Park in Chamarajanagar district.
The Anti-Naxal Force and forest special task force are also on alert and are searching the forests while the local police are keeping tabs on movement of vehicles and people in MM Hills and around the border near Palar bridge while the forest department is on alert near Hogenakkal. They also looking into whether the local farmhouses or hotels run by private establishments or the government have any guests.
Investigating agencies are looking into leads that foreign tourists trekking in the region may have used satphones, there has been no reports of tourist movement around the area since the lockdown was declared three months ago. Although it has been a decade since there were reports of Tamil extremists in the region, police have decided to meet with the forest department at the earliest to obtain information on movement in the forests.
When contacted, forest department officials said they were unaware of satphone usage, and said they needed more staff to patrol the vast forests to keep tabs on poaching, fire control during the summer and for regular patrolling duty.