Joydev Mondal who was arrested in the city. (File picture)

An Asansol-based coal mafia don who had apparently been hiding in tourist hot spots like Switzerland and Singapore has been arrested in the city.

According to police sources, jewellery and mobile phones together worth Rs 1crore were on Joydev Mondal when he was picked up from a chauffer-driven Hyundai Verna in central Calcutta on Tuesday afternoon.

Sleuths claimed to have unearthed evidence of Mondal’s links with arrested CPM leader Sushanta Ghosh. “Our investigation has revealed that he had provided Ghosh with funds and illegal arms procured from Bihar’s Munger for cadres in West Midnapore,” an officer said.

Mondal and driver Rabishankar Singh have been booked under the arms act as 280 bullets, which police sources said were meant for self-loading and Insas rifles, were seized from the car.

“Our officers intercepted Joydev Mondal’s car following a tip-off and arrested him and his driver near Chowringhee Place in central Calcutta,” said Bastab Baidya, deputy commissioner of police, special task force. “Mondal apparently had come to Calcutta to fix an arms deal.”

Police sources said he has a house in Salt Lake.

The accused was wanted in several coal smuggling cases being probed by the state police and the CBI. “Over the past five months he had been hiding in Malaysia, Singapore and Switzerland,” said an officer.

“He was once close to the CPM leadership in Burdwan and was a prime accused in the murder of Trinamul Congress worker Akshay Bauri in Asansol during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls. He switched camps after Trinamul came to power.”

Mondal allegedly went underground after the government started targetting the coal mafia following the daylight murder of realtor and former smuggler Ram Lakhan Yadav and his two aides in Asansol in June. The cops claimed Mondal was the “biggest catch” from the coal belt since Yadav’s murder.

The police said Mondal had been operating illegal coal mines in Asansol, Jamuria, Salanpur and Barabani since 2005. “He also runs brickfields, a paper mill and an iron pin factory, all illegally. At least 50,000 people have been working under him for the past six years,” said an officer.

The smuggled coal is transported on trucks and bullock carts to various sponge iron factories and brickfields across Burdwan, Bankura, Purulia, Birbhum and West Midnapore and sold at half the price charged by the Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL).

In 2003, Mondal had been arrested on the charge of hijacking a truck loaded with refrigerators. He is out on bail in the case.

A CBI team had raided his Asansol house on August 30 but no one was arrested.