NEW DELHI – The Kolkata police reportedly arrested five men over possessionof what they claimed was one kilogramme of Uranium, The Times of Indiareported.

It was further reported that the men had come to the West Bengal state inorder to sell the substance, which, according to the newspaper, had amarket value of INR 30 million ($440,000). The confiscated substance wassent for testing.

Police said the accused had assembled at Mango Lane at Dalhousie andidentified them as Javed Miandad, a resident of Nanur in Birbhum district,SK Mughal, a resident of Sutahata in East Midnapore district, ShahjahanMondal from Baduria in North 24 Parganas district, Younis Biswas and BasantSinha from Behrampore district.

On the contrary, India’s Daily News and Analysis newspaper reported thepolice as saying that the packets did not contain uranium, rather thesubstance was identified as uranium resin, or even as an ion exchangeresin, which are plastic microbeads “used to clean uranium”.

A former scientist, Ravi Kumar Gupta was reported as saying that there aredifferent ‘grades of uranium usable for nuclear energy or weaponsproduction and noted that even low grade or lower radiation uranium can beused as a toxin’.

He said uranium is not used in medicine. He said uranium is a highlycontrolled substance, but ion exchange resin is not. He said the latter hasmany industrial uses including water purification. The specific resinrumoured to be in the packets has an affinity for uranium