Acting on a tip off, police busted an interstate gang of marijuana smugglers, arrested three persons and seized 40kg of the banned substance at Baharagora, Ghatshila, 90km from Jamshedpur, on Friday.

Smuggler Raju Ansari (32), driver Amit Kumar Rajput (30) of the truck from which the ganja was seized and helper Shailesh Kuswaha (28), were caught from a eatery where they had stopped on way to Uttar Pradesh from Odisha.

Ansari is a resident of Buxar district in Bihar. Both Rajput and Kuswaha are from Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh.

The ganja, packed in 20 sacks, was found stuffed inside the cabin of the truck.

SP (rural) Md Arshi said they got a tip-off that a consignment of marijuana was being sent to Uttar Pradesh along with industrial goods in a truck. "It was parked near a dhaba at Kesarda village along NH-33 in Baharagora. Police surrounded the place and found marijuana in the truck's cabin," said Arshi.

As there were over a dozen customers at the eatery, police initially had a problem in detecting the driver and cleaner of the container. "But after an hour-long operation, the police identified Rajput as the driver and Kuswaha as the cleaner. After interrogating the duo, the police team came to know about Ansari, the smuggler," he said.

On April 17, police had seized an ambulance from which 400kg marijuana was recovered at Saraikela but no one was arrested then. Police had seized 80kg of marijuana from a car near Tatanagar in Bagbera on May 2, but no one was caught then too.