The accused Ashwin Naik, brother of late Amar Naik, who was one of the biggest underworld don of Mumbai, and his two associates Amit Mukherjee and Kishore Purshotam Rajput, were arrested at Indo-Bangladesh border by local police at the instance of the Delhi Police on August one while they were trying to cross over to Bangladesh, joint commissioner of police (southern range) Amodh Kant told mediapersons today.

The trio brought here yesterday on transit, were produced in a Delhi court which remanded them to 10 days' police custody.

Their arrest was in sequel to a shootout incident in Nangloi area of West Delhi, in which an alleged LTTE member Sriram Alias Lamboo was killed and another LTTE member Shivraman sustained injuries, and led to recovery of over 15 kg of drugs last month, hesaid.

Interrogation of the trio has so far revealed that these gangsters acted as links between drug cartels based in Pakistan and the LTTE members, he said.

`The drugs were being mainly supplied by Ali Khan, leader of a drug cartel based in Pakistan, to Naik gang who in turn passed it on to LTTE members,' he said, adding, `LTTE members bartered it for sophisticated arms and ammunitions with their contacts in western and West Asian countries, especially Israel.

The investigation has so far revealed that after becoming crippled below the waist as a result of bullet injuries received in the open TADA court in Mumbai, Naik was in a critical state for 22 months and remained in Arthur Road and Kolhapur jail till he was finally released in 1995, Kant said.

His elder brother Amar Naik then decided to shift Ashwin to Delhi for his safety and hired a flat for him in Geetanjali area in South Delhi with the help of Bunny and Bobby, who are known drug traffickers, the joint commissioner of police (JCP)said.

From here Ashwin revived his old contacts among drug traffickers and roped in Mukherjee and Rajput for his activities, Kant said, adding, soon he came across Sriram, a LTTE trained commando, and started supplying drugs to LTTE cadres.

`Naik used to set drug deals with Ali Khan in Pakistan and supplies were sent through Rajasthan and payments were made through hawala transaction,' the JCP said.

In Delhi, the drug consignments were handed over to Sriram who used to get them neatly packed and stacked in a hidden cavity of folding tables and sent to Chennai for onward despatch to Sri Lanka by boat, Kant said.

After the shootout last month, Naik alongwith his two associates crossed over to Nepal and then came back to India after arranging passport and visa to cross over to Bangladesh, but was apprehended by the police, Kant said, adding, further interrogation was on and more arrests were likely.