Kolkata, Mar 24 (IANS): Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Sunday arrested, Saifuddin Molla, another accused in the attack on ED and CAPF at Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal on January 5.

Molla, a local grocery shop owner at Sandeshkhali is known to be a close confidant of now-suspended Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan, the alleged accused mastermind behind the attack.

Sources said following the interrogation of Shahjahan and other accused persons currently in CBI custody, the central agency learnt that Saifuddin Molla played a key role on January 5 in assembling the crowd which attacked the ED and CAPF personnel.

The CBI sleuths also learnt that on January 5 Saifuddin Molla did the networking job sitting from his grocery shop.

A team of CBI and CAPF reached Sandeshkhali escorting two other accused already in the custody of the central agency. Sources said that the two accused spotted the grocery shop owned by Saifuddin Molla. When the central agency sleuths reached the shop, the accused was sitting there.

After some initial interrogation, he was detained by the CBI sleuths.

Although not officially shown as “arrested” as yet, the CBI sleuths have started the process of taking him back to Kolkata for further interrogation at the agency’s Nizam Palace office in central Kolkata.