Young Communist League (YCL) activists have seized 15 tons of red sandalwood from the outskirts of Kathmandu, Wednesday morning and have handed it over to the forest department.

This is the second time in over a week that red sandalwood has been seized. Last week on Wednesday cops had seized 10 ton red sandalwood from Lalitpur district on a tip-off by the YCL.

Putting the seized red sandalwood on display at the Open theatre in Kathmandu, YCL’s valley in-charge Sagar told media persons that the confiscated red sandalwood which was brought from India on a truck via the Rauthahat checkpoint was seized at around 11 pm Tuesday night.

He said the driver of the truck is absconding but assured that those involved in the smuggling would be nabbed.

The smugglers were preparing to take the red sandalwood to China where it is used in traditional medicines and is believed to cure many diseases. In the black market the per kilo of red sandalwood fetches up to Rs 2500.

Over the past few weeks there has been an unprecedented growth in the smuggling of the red sandalwood. DFO Kathmandu officials say that 70 to 80 tons of red sandalwood have been seized till now and that they are discussing with authorities on what is to be done with it.