Man caught smuggling over 2,500 red-eared slider turtles from SG to Bengaluru

SINGAPORE: A man was apprehended at the Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru with 2,547 red-eared slider turtles from Singapore in his possession on July 12. Unfortunately, 517 of the animals were already dead when they were found in his check-in baggage.

The man was identified in an article in The Hindu as 26-year-old Adiakkalasamy Vadivel from Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu. He is said to be involved in global animal smuggling operations.

Vadivel was caught by customs department officials at the airport as soon as his plane landed in Bengaluru. When questioned, he claimed that he had been instructed to hand over the bag to someone else outside the airport.

The Hindu reported the Indian authorities were looking into how Vadivel got the animals past customs officers in Singapore. Importing live animals into India is against the country’s Export-Import (EXIM) Policy and punishable under India’s Customs Act.

According to The Hindu, the Indian authorities said the dead animals would be disposed of according to standard procedures and the rest of the animals were being sent back to Singapore.

Later reports said, however, that when the turtles were sent back to Singapore, the National Park Board’s (NParks) Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation found them to be infected with salmonella. The remaining turtles were then put down.

In a July 22 (Wednesday) report, Mothership quoted NParks — the lead agency responsible for greenery, biodiversity conservation, and wildlife and animal welfare  in Singapore — as saying that while Vadivel possessed an export permit for the turtles, he did not meet the requirements to import them to India.

The report also quoted NParks as saying that because salmonella is “a bacterium of public health and biosecurity concern”, the animals were “humanely put down and disposed of to prevent the potential spread of disease.”

In a related incident in April, a Singapore permanent resident was said to have exported red-eared slider turtles to India without a licence. Forty-one-year-old Rafique Syed Hariza Ali Hussain reportedly placed thousands of turtles in his baggage, getting paid S$500 for each successful delivery in India of the animals.

Mothership reported at the time that red-eared slider turtles are considered an invasive species in India, and therefore their importation is restricted. It added that they were sold in India for around S$7.75 to S$12.40 per turtle. /TISG

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