Nepal’s Armed Police Force rescued two 16-year-old girls who were allegedly being taken to India on the promise of jobs, officials said.

The girls, from Bardiya district, were stopped on Wednesday evening in Narainapur Rural Municipality-1 of Banke district, near the Suiya border point. Police also detained two men, including an Indian national, who had allegedly come to take the girls to India.

A seven-member Armed Police Force team led by Inspector Jhakku Prasad Sharma stopped an auto-rickshaw travelling from Nepalgunj towards India at around 7:50pm after receiving a tip-off, according to the force’s No. 30 Bagheswari Battalion in Banke.

The girls, one from Barbardiya Municipality-2 and the other from Thakurbaba Municipality-8, were initially told to say they were travelling to their maternal uncle’s home in Chaudhary village in India’s Shravasti district, according to the preliminary investigation.

But the girls’ behaviour and account raised suspicions, prompting Sharma to question them further. The investigation indicated that they were being taken across the border after being lured with the promise of employment, the battalion said.

The two men were identified as 30-year-old Yar Mohammad Behna of Kalaphata in Narainapur Rural Municipality-3 and 33-year-old Hanuman Prasad Mahant of Shravasti, Uttar Pradesh.

The Armed Police Force said it seized the auto-rickshaw, an Indian motorcycle and four mobile phones from them.

Superintendent of Armed Police Force Bhim Bahadur Chand, chief of the No. 30 Bagheswari Battalion, said the preliminary investigation indicated that the girls had been lured with promises of work and were being taken to India.