Lucknow, Nov 22 (IANS): The Special Task Force (STF) along with a team of officials of Lucknow Forest unit have arrested three persons for smuggling turtles.

The arrested persons were identified as Ravindra Kumar Kashyap of Malihabad, Saurabh Kashyap of Kakori and Arman Ahmad of Sultanpur.

Lucknow's district forest officer, Ravi Kumar, said at least 175 Indian roofed turtles, 60 Indian tent turtles, 19 crowned river turtles and four Indian-eyed turtles were recovered from the possession of the smugglers.

A motorcycle, Rs 2,460 cash, three mobile phones and other documents were also recovered from them.

The accused were arrested on Sunday from near the Indira Nagar Metro station.

A team led by Deputy Superintendent of Police, STF, Deepak Kumar Singh worked on the case following a tip-off and nabbed the accused when they were about to hand over the consignment to a person.

The prime accused, Raman, told the police that he was into smuggling for years and had a network in Barabanki, Sultanpur, Rae Bareli, Unnao and Bahraich. Raman said he got turtles from fishermen whom he used to pay a small amount.