Police on Sunday arrested a Bangladeshi national at Swarupnagar in North 24Parganas for allegedly attempting to sell his two minor sons to a trafficking racket in India.

The additional chief judi¬cial magistrate’s court in Basirhat remanded Nazim Khalu in police custody for 14 days. Two sons of the accused, aged five and seven, were rescued by the Border Security Force on Wednesday while they were roaming close to the barbed wire fencing in the Indian territory. The children were sent to a government-run shelter.

The state government contacted the Bangladeshi authorities to ascertain the identities of the two children.

The police and BSF sources in Swarupnagar said spotting the two children had in fact led to the arrest of Khalu, a resident of Baikari village in Satkhira district, Bangladesh.

The BSF handed over the boys to the police who launched a search and picked up Khalu from at a hideout at Bhaduria village.

"The BSF actually rescued two siblings and handed them over to us. We talked to the children, who revealed that their father brought them to India to sell them to some people. They came with their father sneaking through the fencing, but he escaped noticing the BSF 117 Battalion's patrolling team. So the boys were roaming close to the fencing when the BSF team spotted them. It appears that the accused brought his two sons to sell them to the racket in India", said an officer of Swarupnagar police.

Police later began a combing operation in the border-adjacent villages and eventually, the accused father of the boys was spotted at a hideout in Bhaduria village.

"We got a tip from the villagers in Bhaduria about the suspected arrival of a person at the house of a local resident. We conducted a raid there and nabbed the man. During preliminary interrogations he confessed to bringing his two children to India", an investigating officer of Swarupnagar police station said.

Police officials meanwhile are examining the authenticity of the whereabouts provided by the accused.

"At the same time, we are interrogating the owner of the house where Nazim took shelter. We are checking if the man was part of the cross-border trafficking racket that is active in the region", a senior police officer of Basirhat police district said.