Rourkela, Aug. 28: Police busted a gang of bike-lifters with the arrest of two persons. They recovered one motorcycle from the duo.

Acting on an a tip-off, Bondamunda police raided Sector-R and arrested Sanjay Choudhury, alias Kuta, 22, and Bitu Tanty, 22.

Apart from the stolen motorcycle, the cops also recovered one single-round country-made pistol, a dagger and a knife. They had been on the lookout for both Kuta and Bitu for quite some time.

On August 20, Kishore Singh alias Ghurghur from Bondamunda and Binod Mahato from Dhanapalli in Jharkhand were taken into custody on bike-lifting charges.

The place is stone's throw from the Odisha-Jharkhand border. Mahato was a receiver of the stolen motorcycles and the police had recovered a bike from him, which he had purchased from Ghurghur at a cost of Rs 8,000. Besides, four stolen bikes were also recovered from Ghurghur.

All of the bikes were stolen from Bondamunda.

Bondamunda inspector Susanta Das said: "We received a tip-off that Kuta and Tanty were seen at Sector-R and were trying to contact prospective customers for selling the motorcycle they had with them. They were in fact planning to escape after selling it at a throwaway price because they were running out of cash. We caught them right before they were about to flee."

The police not only recovered the motorcycle but also grocery items, which they had stolen from a shop a couple of days back.

Das said: "They would keep an eye on motorcycles, which were kept on compounds outside the houses. At night they would jump the boundary wall and unlock the bikes with ease. Ghurghur would escape with the stolen bike. The gang carried out their criminal activities only after 2am."

"We have booked them under Arms Act along with charges of stealing," said Das.