Crackdown against sand mafia: Birbhum Police arrests 32 in two weeks

2 min readUpdated: Jul 5, 2026 10:06 PM IST

At the Girajpur sand ghat, a staggering 15.85 lakh cft of illegally stored sand was found, besides another 14.89 lakh cft sand at the Mollaighat sand ghat. (Image generated using AI)

Birbhum district administration and police have launched a massive crackdown against illegal sand mining and stockpiling, making 32 arrests in a major multi-agency operation within the last two weeks. Besides, the police have registered 52 FIRs, and detected over 30 lakh cubic feet (cft) of illegally stored sand in a span of two weeks.

The enforcement drive reached a flashpoint Thursday following a high-level joint inspection led by Subham Agarwal IAS (ADM LR, Birbhum) and Nilesh Gaikwad IPS (Additional Superintendent of Police, HQ, Birbhum). Acting on intelligence received regarding large-scale illegal stockpiling under the Mohammad Bazar Police Station jurisdiction, a police inquiry supervised by the DSP (D&T) initially confirmed the presence of massive sand mounds at Girajpur and Mollaighat sand ghats.

After the Block Land & Land Reforms Officer (BL&LRO) of Mohammad Bazar confirmed that no official permissions were granted for the repositories, a joint task force of revenue and police officials swooped down on the locations for rigorous laser and physical measurements.

At the Girajpur sand ghat, a staggering 15.85 lakh cft of illegally stored sand was found, besides another 14.89 lakh cft sand at the Mollaighat sand ghat.

“Apart from these massive storage seizures, routine mobile tracking over the last fortnight has led to the confiscation of approximately 23,000 cft of illegal sand in transit and the impounding of 62 vehicles including heavy trucks and tractors actively involved in illegal transportation,” said Birbhum SP, Vidit Raj Bhundesh.

Commenting on the scale of the operation, top district officials stated the joint offensive by the District Magistrate and Superintendent of Police is designed to completely dismantle the economic network of the sand mafias operating in the region. Strict legal proceedings under relevant sections of the law are being initiated against the violators, and round-the-clock monitoring of the riverbeds has been intensified.

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