Online selling of wildlife part with spurious name: a serious challenge for wildlife crime enforcement.

We examined an online sold product "Hatha Jodi" synonym of "paired arm" for the confirmation of its biological source. It was declared as a plant root. The morphological features of these samples were matched with the "intromittent organs" or "hemi penis" of the monitor lizard. For further confirmation, we used sequencing of a partial fragment of mitochondrial DNA cytochrome b gene. Sequence comparison indicated that these claimed plant products were actually biological samples of a common monitor lizard, Varanus bengalensis. Hence, it exhibited the ongoing illegal trade of the intromittent organ of a prohibited species with a misleading name using low risk and widely adopted modern trading method that imposes a severe challenge for combating against the wildlife crime.