Police on Friday night arrested five people in connection with the looting of stones from Sada Pathor quarry in Bholaganj area of Sylhet’s Companiganj upazila.

Confirming the matter, officer-in-charge of Companiganj Police Station Uzayer Al Mahmud Adnan said the arrestees will be produced before the court on Sunday (17 August) in a case filed by the Bureau of Mineral Resources.

However, the police have yet to disclose the identities of those arrested.

Earlier on Friday (15 August), Director General (Joint Secretary) of Bureau of Mineral Development (BMD) Anwarul Habib filed a case against 1,500 to 2,000 unnamed people with Companiganj Police Station over the looting of stones from Bholaganj stone quarry in Companiganj upazila of Sylhet.

The large-scale looting of stones caused a nationwide uproar recently, prompting the High Court to issue an order to recover and reinstall the looted stones and submit a list of suspected people involved in it to the court.

Later, joint forces including police and Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) launched a drive and recovered a total of 1,09,000 cubic feet of looted stones from Jaflong and Sada Pathor areas.

Among these, 40,000 cubic feet of stones were recovered from Narayanganj.

Besides, RAB recovered a large volume of stones from Asampur area under Jaintapur upazila of Sylhet.