Two central agencies — the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) and the Border Security Force (BSF) — seized smuggled gold bars worth around Rs 3 crore from two locations in the past 24 hours.

Sources said the Siliguri and Behrampore regional units of the DRI held a joint raid and arrested two persons from Siliguri More of Raiganj in North Dinajpur district on Saturday evening and recovered gold bars worth around Rs 2.5 crores from them.

“Acting on a tip-off, a car was intercepted near Siliguri More. There were two passengers who said they were going to Raiganj for treatment. They were brought to the Siliguri office of DRI with the vehicle. As the vehicle was searched, 43 gold bars weighing 4.998kg were recovered from a specially built chamber below the driver’s seat. The arrested Mrinal Ali Mondal and Chintu Ghosh are from Hilli in South Dinajpur. During preliminary probe, DRI officials learnt that the duo collected the gold from a person in Hilli.

“We suspect it was smuggled into India from Bangladesh. They were supposed to deliver it to other carriers between Raiganj and Siliguri,” said a source.

In another incident, personnel of the 61 battalion of the BSF posted on the India-Bangladesh border in South Dinajpur district seized over 800 grams of gold on Sunday.Prasanta Biswas, a resident of Rainagar village under Hilli police station, was nabbed as the carrier and handed over to Customs. Sources said he was travelling from Balurghat to Malda by bus. As the bus reached Patiram Bazar, a team of BSF searched the vehicle. Biswas was intercepted with seven gold bars weighing 816.360 grams worth Rs 40.65 lakh.