The Government Railway Police (GRP) on Thursday night seized seven bundles of processed kendu leaf from the railway station here and detained two persons in the connection.
Sources said the leaf which was packed in a gunny bag was worth Rs 40,000.
The two arrestees were identified as Abhijit Manna and SR Majunu of Midanpur (East) district of West Bengal.
As the duo couldn't produce any valid documents for transporting the kendu leaf, they were handed over forest officials.
The officials have registered a case under Section 21 of Odisha Forest permit Transit Rules of 1980 and under Section 14 of Odisha Kendu leaf Control and Trade Act 1961 and forwarded the two accused Abhijit Manna and SR Majanu to court.
Forest officials suspect that the smuggling of processed leaves has been possible due to connivance of the people involved in binding of kendu leaf and some dishonest officials. Besides, they suspect that it might have been brought from kendu leaf godowns, located near railway line from here to Titilagarh or Kantabanji.
Interestingly, The Pioneer had highlighted the smuggling of kendu leaf from the district on June 24, 2017 in one of its reports (Kendu leaf smuggled from Balangir). Despite repeated media reports, why did the district forest officials not strengthen the mechanism to prevent smuggling of kendu leaf, questioned a local here.