Forest officials seize a chameleon, 3 held in Baripada

"We rescued a chameleon from the illegal posession of a tribal man. Our officials also held a man from Kharagpur in West Bengal who came here to purchase the rare chameleon," Bijay K Panda, divisional forest officer (DFO) of Baripara said.

Panda said one Padmalochan Mahanta of Palabani village had caught the Chemeleon from the Similipal area and attempted to sale it at the cost of Rs 5 lakh to Kharagpur based Susant Kumar Mishra. "However, basing on our information, both the buyer and seller have been arrested," the DFO said.

Meanwhile, the forest sleuths also seized a leopard skin (2 ft X 4 ft) from the posession of one anoj Marandi of Gunthibani village under Udala forest range. The man was arrested, he said.