The old house opposite the Jain Basadi in Shetty Galli, near the central bus terminus, was known as a "haunted" place. The neighbours would tell kids not to go near the house. The house is owned by SaleemkhanSherkhanSoudagar, 42, a resident of Khanjar Galli and an animal skin export.The four-room house was full of dust and cobwebs.

In two rooms, the police team, headed by inspector AS Gudigoppa and ACP Shankar Marihal, found material of touring talkies as Saleemkhan used to run a touring talkies earlier. "We broke the locks of three rooms but found nothing but scrap material and we even thought of returning. But the last room had the wildlife parts. When we broke open the lock, there were heaps of deer antlers," Marihal told TOI.

Police got suspicious when they noticed that the accused would send large parcels to Hyderabad almost every day . The sudden increase in the wealth of the accused who has four houses in the city, also raised doubts about his business activities. "We're investigating whether he's trading in poached wildlife parts," Gudigoppa said.

Police found 1,906 deer antlers weighing 960kgs, 2kg of pangolin scales, hair of mongoose, 12 skins of waterdogs and two elephant tusks.Forest department sources said the tusks have to be checked thoroughly as they're quite small.

Forest department sources said deer antlers are much in demand in China, where they're used in making medicines and as ornamental material, while pangolin scales are used in making bulletproof jackets.Mongoose hair is valuable in the international market and used to make paint brushes for artists.

"As wildlife trading is banned in the country , we can't estimate the value of these wildlife parts," said ACF ShivanandNaikwadi.The deer antlers will be sent to the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology , Hyderabad and the Wildlife Institute of India in Dehradun, Uttarakhand to get an idea of their age.

Naikwadi said most antlers were not obtained through poaching but after natural shedding.

Twist in tale

CCIB police arrested three persons - SaleemkhanSoudagar, MazarkhanSoudagar and AhmadkhanSoudagar - under sections 2(2), (11), (14), (16), (35) and 9, 39, 44, 48, 49 (B), 51, 51 (a) of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 for illegally possessing wildlife material. However, the main accused produced documents which proved that all the wildlife material was seized in a raid by the Belagavi range forest officer in 1998 and he had a certificate which showed he could possess them. Moreover, all the deer antlers have been numbered by the forest department.

Naikwadi said the certificate was issued before the amendment to the Wildlife Protection Act banning trading and possessing wildlife parts.