8 Arrested In Uttar Pradesh Presuming Radioactive Substance Californium

Eight people have been arrested from Ghazipur area in Lucknow for allegedly selling what was presuming to be radioactive substance californium, police said on Friday.
The accused were stopped for checking near Lucknow’s Polytechnic crossing on Thursday and 340 gm substance, suspected to be californium, was seized from them, Police Commissioner DK Thakur told news agency PTI.

During interrogation the accused informed police that the substance was used in cancer treatment, the officer said adding that it was being sent to IIT-Kanpur for identification.

“If it is Californimum, it can be worth crores of rupees,” Mr Thakur said.

Those arrested have been identified as Mahesh Kumar, Ravi Shankar, Amit Kumar, Shital Gupta, Abhishek Chakravarty, Harish Chowdhury, Ramesh Tiwari and Shyam Sundar.