Dhubri: It was the ambulance’s route — not its siren — that gave it away.Police in Assam’s Dhubri district made a startling discovery on Monday night after chasing an ambulance coming from West Bengal near the Ratiadaha traffic point. Inside the vehicle were three cows — and no patient.The ambulance had taken a village road instead of the usual highway route, raising suspicion among Agomoni police. The driver abandoned the vehicle and fled under cover of darkness.Police suspect the ambulance was being used to transport cattle towards the Bangladesh border while evading routine checks.The seizure points to a new tactic in cattle-smuggling operations along the Assam-West Bengal border. Smugglers have previously used trucks, vans, private cars and boats to move cattle. Using an ambulance, police said, appears to be an attempt to exploit the vehicle’s emergency-service identity and avoid scrutiny.“Normally, ambulances take the NH-17. But when we saw the vehicle coming from the village, we grew suspicious,” Agomoni police station officer-in-charge Bhupendar Rout said.The ambulance and the cattle have been taken into custody. Police have launched an investigation to identify those involved, establish the intended destination of the animals and trace the absconding driver through the vehicle’s registration number.A Dhubri police source said smugglers often avoid the main entry points from West Bengal — Boxirhat in Cooch Behar and Srirampur in Jalpaiguri — and instead use village roads to evade checks.Several of these routes lead towards the Brahmaputra, enabling the cattle to be moved by boat to villages near the international border. From there, the animals are allegedly pushed across porous stretches where fencing is absent or incomplete.The ambulance seizure comes amid intensified action against cattle smuggling in western Assam. Since January 2025, police have seized 456 cattle in areas under Dhubri Sadar, Gauripur, Bilasipara, Fakirganj, Golokganj, Agomoni and Tamarhat police stations.
