PLFI's Bihar in-charge, 3 other members held in Patna

Four hardcore members of the banned extremist group PLFI, including its Bihar in-charge Awadehsh Jaiswal, were arrested here by the police today.
Two pistols, 13 cartridges, 24 firearms and gun-making equipment have been recovered from the arrested persons.
People's Liberation Front of India (PLFI) is a splinter group of the banned CPI (Maoist) and currently active in Jharkhand.
Patna SSP Jitendra Rana said the organisation had been planning to spread its tentacles in Bihar by extorting levy and commiting some big crimes under the leadership of Jaiswal alias Abodh alias Chuhwa. The group was also involved in manufacturing weapons as part of their expansion plans.

The SSP said the organisation was also involved in the high-intensity Improvised Explosive Device (IED) explosion at Bahadurpur Housing Colony in Patna on March 30 last.
Though nobody was injured in the incident, two live timer-attached bombs were recovered from the spot.

"The arrests were made on the basis of intelligence inputs. A team of police officers and Special Task Force (STF) members was constituted under the leadership of City SP (East) Sudhir Kumar Porika, which snared Jaiswal and other members of PLFI.
"Jaiswal has confessed he was behind the Bahadurpur bomb blast and had plans to expand the organisation in Bihar to extort levy from people," Rana said.

Jaiswal, a native of Nalanda district, has been involved in various crimes related to murder, gun-running and Maoist violence and has served seven years of prison sentence. He was currently absconding in a murder case.
The three other arrested have been identified as Siddhi Kumar, Santosh Kumar and Suraj Kumar, who were residents of various places in Patna district.
Among them, Siddhi was an accused in cases of kidnapping, bank dacoities and murder in Bihar, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, senior police officers said adding, he was a notorious arms supplier and had previously supplied AK-47 assault rifles and ammunition to the PLFI.