Kolkata: Border Security Force personnel apprehended one person from West Bengal’s North 24 Parganas district for allegedly smuggling 29 kilogram of hilsa from Bangladesh, BSF said on Friday.
During night patrolling at Dobarpara border outpost on Thursday, BSF troops saw a man riding a motorbike on a road along the international boundary. When they stopped him for checking, it was found that he was carrying hilsa, a favourite fish of Bengalis, in two large bags.
A BSF statement said that he collected the hilsa from one person in Bangladesh and was supposed to deliver it to a man in Bangao, also in North 24 Parganas district.
The apprehended man said during interrogation that he used to work in a pipe factory in Gujarat. He returned home during lockdown and started smuggling two-three months ago after failing to find a job.
The man, a resident of a village in Gaighata area of the district, was handed over to the police for further investigation and legal action.
BSF personnel had seized 15 kg of hilsa and nine kg of tilapia fish from two Indian smugglers during a special checking operation in Ghojadanga, also in North 24 Parganas, on Wednesday.
BSF troops have apprehended another Indian smuggler in Malda district and seized from him 588 bottles of a particular brand of cough syrup, worth Rs Rs 99,708 on Thursday night.
The bottles were being smuggled to Bangladesh, BSF said in another statement.
The cough syrup which contains Codeine phosphate, a narcotic drug, is in demand in the neighbouring country for its addictive quality.