The BSF arrested five persons and seized an illegal consignment of 41 buffaloes from a container truck en route Assam on Wednesday afternoon in Jalpaiguri.

The cattle, BSF sources said, were supposed to be smuggled to Bangladesh.

The 98th battalion of the force intercepted the vehicle bearing a registration number of Rajasthan on NH27 near the BSF camp in Raninagar on the outskirts of Jalpaiguri. The truck was searched and the cattle was recovered. The BSF team asked the driver to furnish documents to validate transportation of the animals but the driver failed to do so.

The truck was seized and five persons, including the driver, were nabbed. Two of them are from Bengal while the other three are from Jharkhand, Bihar and Assam.

The estimnated vaule of the seized items (cattle and truck) is around ₹27.67 lakh, the BSF sources said.

Later, the five youths along with the truck and cattle were handed over to police.

Narcotic seized

Malda police seized around 300 grams of brown sugar, a derivative of heroin, and arrested two persons in this connection on Tuesday night.

The police intercepted an SUV at Bamongram Kurir Bagan area and found the narcotic in three plastic bags. The contraband, police said, was supposed to be delivered to Dalkhola in the neighbouring North Dinajpur district.

Those arrested have been identified as Asim Sheikh and Samim Akhtar, both residents of Mosimpur Beltala village.

The vehicle has also been seized.

Unaccounted cash

Police arrested Manoj Sonkar during the routine naka checkings in Calcutta on Wednesday for allegedly carrying ₹40 lakh whose source could not be explained.

Two more persons were held with alleged unaccounted ₹6.7 lakh later in the day in the city.