Bengaluru: In a first, 72 spotted-black terrapins were seized at the Kempe Gowda International Airport on early on Monday. The turtles were found in the bag of two flyers from Chennai, who were travelling to Thailand in a Malaysian Airlines flight.

The scanning personnel at the airport found something moving inside their bag and the security officers ordered them to open the bags. The terrapins that were stuffed in two large suitcases were being smuggled out of the country. The owners of the bag, Imran Khan and Haroon Rashid, who live in Chennai, were arrested and handed over to the Devanahalli police.

Both the accused were produced before a Devanahalli court on Monday evening and were remanded to judicial custody. The security personnel said that during the interrogation, the accused duo confessed that the turtles were brought from Kolkata and were being taken to Thailand. The turtles were suspected to be caught in the Ganga river.

Mr Sharath Babu, a honorary wildlife warden, said that it’s a rare case of turtles being smuggled out through the Bengaluru airport. “There were a few instances of these turtles being smuggled out of the Kolkata airport, but this is the first time we are recording such a case in Bengaluru. About seven years ago, activists in Bengaluru had seized a large cargo of 700 red-eared turtles at the HAL Airport,” he said.

Wildlife experts said that the case is an eye-opener and the airport in Bengaluru has been on the radar of wildlife smugglers. “There has been a demand to appoint a dedicated wildlife expert team at the airport who could keep an eye on the cargo. It’s important that regular vigilance is maintained at the airport to stop smuggling of wildlife articles,” an expert suggested.

Incidentally, this is a second case of terrapins being smuggled through airports in the last one month. Around 130 pond turtles were seized by the Customs Department at the Dhaka Airport in Bangladesh. Those turtles were also being smuggled to Malaysia through a Malaysian Airlines flight. Theses turtles are mostly used as pets and some even use them as food, wildlife experts said.