Lucknow, Mar 21 (IANS): A team of the Uttar Pradesh Police's Special Task Force (STF) has arrested two persons for smuggling birds here.

The STF has recovered 206 parrots and 18 'munias' from them.

Significantly, the cops made the arrests on the occasion of the World Sparrow Day (March 20) from the weekly bird market in the old city.

The miscreants have been identified as Rajpati and Shahnawaz.

According to an official release, the recovered birds are of rare species.

Deputy Superintendent of Police, STF, Deepak Kumar Singh said the team got a tip-off that Shahnawaz had smuggled huge numbers of parrots and munias from Punjab and he, along with Rajpati, was about to sell them in the bird market in Nakhas.

"A team was dispatched to the market where both Shahnawaz and Rajpati were found present with the birds in their possession. Both owned up their crime and said they were into the illegal sale and purchase of rare species of birds for last one decade," Singh said.