Cuttack, Jan. 30: Brothers Sushant, 45, and Sushil Dhal Samant, 42, allegedly had close links with Mumbai and Calcutta criminals, who were keen to expand their base in Odisha through them.

The brothers were planning to commit "something big" in Odisha considering the huge cache of arms seized from their CDA house at Sector-6, police said on Saturday.

The police are searching various places to find out more about the two. They have already reportedly seized a diary with names, addresses, and telephone numbers of influential politicians and a few criminals. "We are trying to ascertain the links that the two gangsters had with these people," a police official said.

Photographs of an event organised by the duo and attended by a few politicians on January 10 in Cuttack, are already doing the rounds.

Union minister of state for petroleum Dharmendra Pradhan, who had attended the blood donation camp organised by the brothers, said: "If a politician is involved with a criminal and committed a crime in connivance with him, then it is an offence. As far as I know, I have not done any such thing. Moreover, till the time the court has convicted a person, he cannot be called a criminal," Pradhan said.

Other politicians who had attended the event included Congress leader Bhakta Charan Das, BJD MLAs Debashish Samantray and Rajashree Mullick and BJP leader and former minister Samir Dey.

Senior officials suspect that the gangster siblings were part of a major a inter-state illicit arms trade racket and were supplying sophisticated weapons to small-time criminals. Four mausers with 127 live bullets, a carbine, a double-barrelled gun along with 22 bullets and more than Rs 2.64 crore in cash, apart from a cash-counting machine, had been recovered from their house on plot no-B/1444, Sector-6.

The arms were kept in a box hidden in the false ceiling of one of the bathrooms on the second floor of the CDA house while the cash was kept in three bags in the cupboard, police said. The sophisticated carbine similar to that used by armed forces personnel is said to have procured for Rs 2 lakh.

A senior police official requesting anonymity said a detailed investigation would be carried out to ascertain the source of the deadly weapons procured by the gangster siblings.

On Thursday night, the special police team had recovered three pistols, 108 live ammunition and 13 mobile phones from Sushil and his elder brother Sushanta during a raid at Pokhariput.

Police sources said the Dhal Samant brothers operated a wide crime syndicate with assistance from some criminals and mafia operating from other parts of the country. It is suspected that they received funds through the hawala racket and were investing them to procure arms to operate the syndicate that was mainly concentrated in the Odisha coastal belt.

A large amount of the money earned through tender-fixing and extortion was invested in real estate in different parts of the state.

Two close associates of the gangster brothers, who are now absconding, operated the entire crime syndicate.

"Once we bring the (Dhal Samant) duo on remand, we hope to collect more information about the crime network following their interrogation," said police commissioner Y.B. Khurania.

Special police teams have been formed to conduct further probe into the links of Dhal Samant brothers outside the state.

The cops' focus will be on ascertaining the criminal links of Sushant, who was on the run for the past 14 years, particularly in Andhra Pradesh, Calcutta and Mumbai.Sushant usually travelled under the name of Manoj Patnaik and this has been revealed through a driving licence seized from his possession.

Thirteen cases, including three murder ones, are registered against Sushant while 11 cases, including tender-fixing and extortion, are lodged against his younger brother Sushil.

Preliminary investigation reveals that Sushil had political ambitions and was trying hard to shed the gangster tag for the past two years. He had also set up a company called Metaphor Trans Corporation Pvt Ltd and a media house around two years ago.

It is suspected that the company was a medium to convert the black money into white. He had also founded the Cuttack Nagar Yuvak Sangha and was trying to portray himself as a leading social activist by organising welfare activities.