Police busted a cellphone stealing racket here on Thursday, seizing stolen phones worth Rs 3.25 lakh and arresting two persons in this connection.

Sources said that over the past five months, an e-commerce company found that phones to be delivered through a courier service in Malda often went missing.

“In all, the company found cell phones worth Rs 23.70 lakh missing. All thesephones were routed through the courier company with its office in Nityanandapur under Malda police station,” said a source.

On Thursday, the company contacted the police. The police gathered details of the missing phones and located their present users. It was found that these people bought phones from Sujapur and Kaliachak areas.

The police then went to the shops in those areas.

“The shop owners showed the police the bills. It was found that one seller sold them the phones. The seller was nabbed. He revealed that Suman Ghosh, an employee of the courier company, supplied him the phones,” the source added.

Suman, a resident of Disco More, was arrested. So was another person, whose name the police have not revealed.

Through them, the police came to know there werefive persons, either employees or ex-employees of the courier company, involved in theracket. They would make holes in sacks and packets of the e-commerce company, take out the phones andsell them.

“They would tell the courier firm that the item was damaged or missing,” said a source.

So far, the police traced 28 cell phones worth around Rs 3.25 lakh.

On Friday, the arrested duo were produced in court and sent in police custody for seven days.