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TOI : PUNE: The forest department on Saturday arrested three people in connection with the death of peacocks in Khedkar Vasti near Ranjangaon in Shirur taluka.

Those arrested include a poultry farm owner in the area and his two workers. The suspects were identified as Abhijeet Kalamkar, Bhaskar Tukaram Bangar and Rajaram Sandbhor.

Since August, 32 peacocks have been found dead around Kalamkar’s farm in Khedkar Vasti.

After regional forensic science laboratory reports confirmed that the birds had died because of insecticides scattered around Kalamkar’s poultry farm, forest officers swung into action and arrested the three.

The forest department’s investigation team also seized a bottle of pesticides from the spot.

Khedkar Vasti is close to Morachi Chincholi, a village known for peacock tourism.
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TOI : PUNE: The city police’s crime branch on Saturday nabbed five people for allegedly kidnapping a law student and his friend for a Rs 50-lakh ransom. Interestingly, the gang had pulled off the kidnapping using a cigarette lighter that looked like a pistol.

The suspects were identified as Vaibhav alias Pintya Chaudhari (26) of Sahakarnagar, Rupesh Sable (22) of Bibvewadi, Amjadkhan Pathan (28) of Shivdarshan and Lokesh Pulavle (29) and Mangesh alias Munna Pulavle (30), both residents of Chavannagar on the Pune-Satara highway.

The police recovered the lighter, mobile phones stolen from the victims and their friends and a jeep, together worth Rs. 2.04 lakh, from the suspects. Shahjad Bhat (24), a law student living in Mahatma society in Kothrud, lodged a complaint in the case with the Kothrud police.

Acting on a tip-off, a police team led by inspector Vijaysingh Gaikwad of unit-I of the crime branch nabbed the gang on the Pune-Satara road near Padmavati around 4 pm.

Gaikwad told TOI that around 8 pm on Friday, the suspects entered Bhat’s house. They bundled Bhat and his friend Naved Ali into the jeep at gunpoint. The suspects also stole seven mobiles from Bhat and his friends. They then drove the two to Khamgaon village on the Pune-Solapur road, Gaikwad said. Near the village, the kidnappers got drunk. Taking advantage of this, Bhat and Ali managed to escape.

They walked around 12 km to the Kothrud police station.

On Saturday, constable Sunil Pawar of the crime branch received a tip-off about the whereabouts of the suspects, leading to their arrest.

The suspects had planned to demand Rs 50 lakh as ransom from the duo’s families, Gaikwad said. Chaudhari and Lokesh have criminal records.

The police team that arrested the kidnappers comprised, besides Shelke and Pawar, constables Rajendra Marne, Yogesh Jagtap and Narendra Parkhi….More

TOI : PUNE: Former United Nations under-secretary-general Shashi Tharoor, who is the chairman of the Commonwealth Youth Games (CYG) green council, said here on Saturday that Pune should set an example by conducting a major sporting event with environmental sensitivity.

Tharoor, who was in Pune to flag of the sustainable transport rally on Saturday, said the CYG green council has planned a four-pronged approach to manage consumption of carbon-intensive energies during the games.

The aim, he said, is to avoid use of carbon-intensive energies, reduce usage of power, replace high-intensive sources with low intensive ones and offset the consumption with renewable sources.

“It is a positive thing to hold a major sporting event like the CYG, but because of the adverse impact on the environment, it also has its negatives. For example, during any mega sporting event, the influx of athletes, officials, spectators is big. Consequently, there is large-scale usage of land, increased waste generation, a rise in usage of electricity and transportation etc. We have to be conscious of the impact of all this and more on nature. The challenge is to ensure consumption neutrality during the games,” said Tharoor.

“In fact, we are in the advanced stages of negotiations with a company which will offset the equivalent amount of energy consumed during the games with renewable sources of energy that will be generated elsewhere,” he said.

He added that the opening and closing ceremonies of any games are usually the most high-energy intensive, so every effort will be made to generate equivalent energy with renewable sources.

Other initiatives to make CYG the ‘green games’ are using low intensity fire crackers during the opening ceremony, installation of solar street lights, commissioning a sewage treatment plant at the games venue and planting a large number of trees.

“Another attempt to reduce pollution emission will be to use…More

TOI : PUNE: There were isolated cases of flooding in the city and the water discharge from the Khadakwasla, Mulshi and Pavana dams increased as the wet spell continued on Saturday with the recorded rainfall being 19.6 mm.

The India Meteorological Department has said that over the next 24 hours there will be intermittent heavy showers and drizzles in the city, while parts of north Maharashtra will continue to receive heavy spells of rain.

Since catchment areas of dams supplying water to the city also witnessed incessant rains on Saturday, 22,000 cusecs of water was discharge from the Khadakwasla dam. Pavana and Mulshi dams saw a discharge of 15,000 cusecs of water each.

On Friday evening also, the discharge from Khadakwasla dam had been increased to 22,000 cusecs, which continued till Saturday morning. Later, for some hours, it was decreased to 17,000 cusecs. However, due to the heavy rain, water storage level at the Khadakwasla dam went up. Following this, the water discharge was again increased from 17,000 to 22,000 cusecs in the afternoon.
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TOI : PUNE: In a major crackdown, the anti-narcotics cell of the Pune crime branch on Friday arrested a woman from Ambarnath in Thane district and seized 1.127 kg heroin worth Rs 11.43 lakh from her house.

Crime sleuths claim this is the second largest seizure of heroin in the last three years. In 2005, anti-narcotics cell officials had arrested a man, who is currently serving rigorous imprisonment, in Pune and had recovered 1.5 kg heroin from him, said inspector G.V. Nikam of the anti-narcotic cell.

The suspect arrested in Ambarnath was identified as Annapurna Gaikwad (40). She was produced before the judicial magistrate first class in Pimpri court on Saturday and remanded to police custody till September 24.

Last week, Nikam told TOI, his team had arrested a college student, who is a drug addict. During interrogation, the youth revealed the name of a drug peddler in Pimpri, who used to sell him the drugs.

Acting on the tip-off, the team laid a trap near Bharatnagar slums in Pimpri on Thursday and nabbed drug peddler Datta Suresh Bagal (20). Eight gm of heroin, worth Rs 16,180, was found in his possession.

During interrogation Bagal revealed that the drugs being sold in the city, mainly in Pimpri-Chinchwad and Yerawada, were sourced from Ambarnath. He also gave Gaikwad’s name and address to the police.

According to Nikam, the police raided Gaikwad’s house in Ambarnath at 12.30 pm on Friday. The police searched her house and found 1.127 kg of heroin in boxes on a shelf. She was arrested and brought to Pune, he said.

Investigations revealed that Gaikwad has been in the business for the past few years, but does not have a police record. “We are investigating who and where she bought the drugs from and who financed the procurements. We suspect that more people are involved…More