Thane: Seven persons were on Saturday detained by the Maharashtra Forest department following the unearthing of monkeys and pigeons buried in the premises of an oil marketing firm in neighbouring Raigad district, police said.

Acting on a tip-off, a Forest department team reached the premises of BPCL in Panvel's Posri area and exhumed the bodies of 31 monkeys and 14 pigeons, said Chief Conservator of Forests S R Kadam. He said post-mortem was conducted by a veterinary doctor in Panvel and some body parts had been sent to the Haffkine Institute, a premier biomedical research facility, in Mumbai for further examination.