Calcutta, June 8: Sophisticated arms-making machines and weapons were seized from an illegal factory in a raid at South 24-Parganas’ Kalikapur yesterday.

Police have arrested Hermat Sheikh, who was said to be involved in an international arms racket. Diamond Harbour subdivisional police officer Mehmood Akhtar said machines made in Japan and China, which were used for making the arms, were seized from the factory about 70 km from Calcutta.

Hermat was produced in the subdivisional judicial magistrate’s court in Diamond Harbour and remanded in custody for 10 days. “We were looking for him for more than eight months. When caught, he was carrying cartridges in a simple gunny bag,” Akhtar said.

Half-a-dozen guns, a dozen revolvers, a large number of sophisticated explosives, empty cartridge shells, half-made guns and tools used to make them were recovered in the raid.