One of South India's most notorious red-sanders smugglers wants to surrender - Here's why

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He is known as Junior Veerappan in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. And it seems the notorious red sanders international smuggler Sahul Hameed who has been operating out of Dubai for years wants to surrender to the Andhra Pradesh police.

According to a Deccan Chronicle report, Hameed's offer follows the arrest of his son Azharuddin by the Tirupati Urban police from Mumbai. Hameed, through mediators, has reportedly communicated to the AP police that he is ready to give up.

“He is claiming his son is innocent and had little role in the red sanders smuggling. He told the mediators that he was the actual kingpin,” the report quotes a senior AP police officer as saying.

Red sanders smuggling is known to be a thriving underworld business that involves the felling of the trees and transporting them to China, where they are high in demand for musical instruments and furniture.

Who is Sahul Hameed?

Sahul Hameed has been active for at least a decade and is a big name in the business.

One of the earliest mentions about him was in 2004, when Hameed, a Singapore citizen, was arrested by Customs officials in Chennai with connection to red sanders smuggling. However, he jumped bail and has been operating from Dubai ever since.

In 2011, when the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) foiled a bid to smuggle out red sanders worth crores of rupees to Dubai through Kochi port, his name figured again, this time as a kingpin.

Though not much is known about Hameed's past, it was learnt later on that he was a close aide of Shafeeq from Thalassery, a business man who is believed to be the head of all major red sanders operations.

Hameed was also believed to be doing business with most wanted red sanders smuggler Gangi Reddy, who was arrested by the Interpol in Mauritius while he was trying to board a flight to Sri Lanka in February this year. Gangi Reddy was also one of the accused in the attack on Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu in 2003 at Alipiri.

However, the sheer size of Hameed's operation came to light in May this year, when at least a 100 smugglers from Tamil Nadu and AP flew to the UAE to attend his daughter's wedding, despite the Chittoor and Tirupati police trying to nab them at the airport

The police had admitted that the nexus was too massive, while adding that UAE refused to deport Hameed claiming "he was not involved in any offence in their country."

The trees have been listed as Endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, which makes the risk greater, but the profit higher for smugglers.

Reports describe how these Red sander smugglers, who were apprehended over the years, have assets worth crores, fast sports cars and splurge money in five-star hotels with fashion models, just by operating for a few years.

The route

The AP police have also ascertained since that around a 1,000 tonnes of red sanders were sent out of AP in the first few months of 2015 alone, from AP to Dubai by air or sea and then to Pakistan, eventually travelling to China by land. Another route is from West Bengal to Bangladesh or Burma and then to China

A major breakthrough in the case occurred on July 30 when Hameed's son, Aseem, was nabbed while boarding a flight to Dubai.

DRI sources told Mumbai Mirror that shipping consignments were sent to Dubai from Chennai, Kochi and Mumbai disguised as goods for export, including plywood and footwear.

The AP police had also written to the CBI, which in turn approached Interpol for issuing a red corner notice against Hameed and extract him back to India.