Guwahati, Jul 15 (IANS): Two persons have been arrested here after gold bars -- smuggled from Bangladesh valued at Rs 34 lakh --  were found in their possession,  an official said on Saturday.

The police said the gold was seized on Friday night during a special operation.

The gold was brought to India illegally from Bangladesh via Meghalaya.

A senior police officer said that the Special Task Force (STF) initiated an operation in the city on Friday after it received information on a gold smuggling deal.

"Our squad had been following a car coming from Meghalaya when we saw the driver swapping goods with a motorbike rider in the Lokhra neighbourhood of Guwahati. The rider managed to escape because of the traffic, so we were unable to catch him at the time," the officer said.

Later, the car's driver guided the STF team to the biker's rented accommodation in the city

"When we got to the residence, we discovered that the biker started melting the gold bars that had been taken earlier from the car. Both the biker and the car's driver have been taken into custody," the police officer said.

According to the police, a total of 585 kg of gold that was seized is valued at around Rs 34 lakh.

Rs 22.70 lakh in cash was also found inside the house of the biker.