Englishbazar police on Saturday busted an e-rickshaw stealing racket allegedly operating in three police station areas of Malda district.

In all, six persons have been arrested in this connection, three from Sakullahpur area of Mothabari police station, two from Bhutni and one from Englishbazar. Five stolen e-rickshaws have been seized. The gang, police sources said, would steal new e-rickshaws, remodel them and sell them through agents.

Ashis Das, the inspector-in-charge of Englishbazar police station, said in recent times they got many complaints of e-rickshaw thefts, prompting them to form a special probe team.

Police said the arrested Pintu Chowdhury, Utpal Karmakar, Jangali Chowdhury, Rajkumar Mandal, Nabokrishna Mandal, Mohan Chowdhury and some others ran the racket. If the stolen e-rickshaws were old, they were dismantled and sold as scrap and the their engines were sold in the grey market. But if the vehicles were new, they would remodel and put on a fresh coat of paint on the vehicles and sell them again.

“We are now trying to find out whether the same racket was involved in stealing e-rickshaws in Kaliachak, Baishnabnagar and other police station areas of the district,” added Das.

Police have identified owners of the five vehicles which have been recovered during the raid and would hand them back their vehicles.