14-day judicial custody for Anant Singh

A Barh court on Sunday remanded controversial Bihar MLA Anant Singh to judicial custody for two weeks in connection with the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) case lodged against him.

Singh, who had surrendered on Friday in Delhi, was produced before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) of Barh, Pankaj Tiwari.

The ACJM sent him to 14 days' judicial custody. Singh will be lodged in Patna's Beur central jail.

"An application for seeking Anant Singh on remand for interrogation could not be taken in the absence of regular court. Police will make application on Monday in this regard," Patna Superintendent of Police (Rural) Kantesh Kumar Mishra said.

The legislator, who was on the run after the police had registered the case against him following seizure of an AK-47 rifle and grenades from his ancestral home on August 16, had appeared before Saket Court Metropolitan Magistrate Harun Pratap on Friday and surrendered.

A police team headed by Barh Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Lipi Singh and Danapur ASP Ashok Mishra brought the Mokama MLA from New Delhi on Sunday morning and took him directly to Barh from Patna Airport amid tight security.

Police had raided the ancestral home of Singh, an Independent MLA from Mokama, on August 16 and seized an AK-47 rifle, a magazine, live cartridges and two hand grenades.

Police conducted a second raid at the 1, Mall Road, official residence of Singh in Patna on August 17 but he was not present. His accomplice Chhotan Singh was, however, apprehended from there.

A sword and a mobile phone were also seized from the legislator's official residence.

Singh had claimed that he has not visited his ancestral house in the past 14 years.

Singh - nicknamed as "Chhote Sarkar"- has a long criminal record and was recently summoned to the police headquarters in Patna for giving his voice sample in connection with an attack on a Mokama-based contractor.

He was formerly known to have shared a close relationship with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar but the two apparently fell out ahead of the 2015 assembly elections.

Singh then left the JD(U) and contested and retained his seat as an Independent.