Patna SSP Amrit Raj with the arrested criminals on Thursday. Picture by Ranjeet Kumar Dey

Patna, Sept. 20: Two persons, one of them a Bangladeshi national, were arrested while applying for a passport at the Ashiana Nagar-based Passport Seva Kendra today.

Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Amrit Raj said one Mohammed Nurobi tried to use Hussainganj, Siwan, as address to apply for the passport. He was being questioned, along with his associate, a tout.

“The second man, said to be Nurobi’s associate, has been identified as Shahbul Haque. He is a resident of Hussainganj, which falls under the jurisdiction of Markan police station of Siwan. Nurobi is a Bangladeshi national. He said he hails from Sonagazi Feni area of Bangladesh. In the course of questioning, we will try to find for how long he has been living in Bihar. The tout is also being interrogated,” the senior officer said.

Regional passport officer Anand Kumar said the duo had come to the office at around 10am.

“In the office, the documents of all the applicants are checked thoroughly by the officials. The documents stated that Nurobi’s date of birth was January 1, 1980. During the checking, the official asked him certain questions and Nurobi was unable to answer them. He was not able to speak proper Hindi. The official had a doubt as his accent wasn’t correct and he was very nervous. He pointed at another man (Haque), who he said was with him and the officials questioning him too,” Anand said.

“On questioning, both tried to flee but the security guards nabbed the duo. They were handed over to the Shastri Nagar police,” he added.

The state has been a haven for illegal Bangladeshi residents for a while now.

On June 27, four members of a Bangladeshi family residing in the capital were arrested. Later, they were found to be frauds involved in duping people.

In another incident, one Manglesh Singh, a resident of Gaya, was arrested with 500 live cartridges on him today.

“The person was arrested near Mahavir Sthan near Patna Junction. We had information about this man coming to Patna for an arms deal. We had set a trap last night. Today he was arrested and a briefcase was found. We found 500 lives cartridges with Made in Serbia tag on a box in which the bullets were stored,” Raj said.

He added: “During interrogation, Singh admitted he was involved in the theft at Patna Museum on September 26, 2006.”