His phone was stolen in Dhanmondi. He got it back from India

On 7 November of last year, Ferdous Miah was on way to his relative's Dhanmondi home when his phone, a Samsung S23 Ultra, was suddenly snatched. 

The phone had a market value of a princely sum exceeding Tk1 lakh at the time.

"I was on Dhanmondi-8, standing underneath a Banyan tree. Two people on a motorcycle pulled over next to me and snatched my phone. At first, I thought it was a prank. Then I realised I had been mugged," Ferdous Miah, deputy jailer at Dinajpur, recalled.   

That night he registered a general diary with the Dhanmondi Police Station. He also downloaded an app, "SmartThings" developed by Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, dedicated for Samsung users. Using it, he found that the phone had been switched off and so couldn't track its location.

Police also informed him that the phone would be found once it was switched on.

Since then, Ferdous remained glued to his phone, waiting to see if his phone would be switched on.

Months later, one day Ferdous turned on the app and found that his phone was finally switched on.

"It was a eureka moment initially but my enthusiasm fizzled out soon after I saw the live location. It was in Amreli, a city of India's northern state Gujarat, around 2,548 kilometres away from Dhaka. The chances of getting my phone back were quite slim," Ferdous said to The Business Standard. 

Law enforcers informed Ferdous that most of the expensive stolen phones were smuggled to India to evade police drive and recovery. 

The Dhaka Metropolitan Police's Detective Branch, in a recent drive, busted such a transnational racket from Dhaka's Badda area which had been operating in the both countries. 

They told him the chance of recovering a phone smuggled to India was next to nothing. But Ferdous Miah was stubborn.

Using the internet as his guide, Ferdous found that the only solution was to email the relevant authorities in the government of India and both the countries' high commissions.

"I had no choice but to send those emails. I emailed the Bangladesh and India high commissions, the Gujarat home affairs secretary, state nodal officer of Gujarat and Gujarat Police Commissioner with all the documents of the stolen mobile phone's live location, copies of general diary, IMEI numbers and phone purchase receipt."

Ferdous recalled checking his email every day since. Weeks into the first email and in the face of no response, Ferdous felt the chances of recovering his phone had disappeared.

Then came 1 March and a call from a foreign number. 

"At first I thought it was a phishing scam. But the voice from the other side introduced himself as a police official of Gujrat. I didn't believe it at first. He asked for my address and I gave it. It was a prank, I told myself," Ferdous recalled.

A few days later, a parcel arrived at Ferdous' home. Nestled inside it was his prized possession, the Samsung S23 Ultra.

Revisiting the incident, Ferdous said it was a wise idea to never give up.

"I will suggest to every common man not to give up. Try available sources and mail the authorities concerned if your phone lands in the hands of a transnational racket. Don't lose hope, you never know you may get your phone back from around 2,500 km away across the border, from a rural municipality," he said with a grin.