Malda: The NIA has made its first arrest in the case of siege of judicial officers involved in SIR verification in Mothabari, Malda on April 1, detaining two Congress members and one ISF member. On Sunday, Congress’s Sahadat Hussain and Asif SK were taken into custody along with ISF’s Golam Rabbani. Local Congress candidate Saim Choudhary was also interrogated but later released. NIA’s preliminary findings suggest that the siege was pre-planned and involved a multi-layered conspiracy. Investigators found that Rabbani had held a meeting the day before the violence, while Asif and Sahadat were present during the movement. All three were presented in the NIA court in Kolkata. Sahadat is an official of Congress Trade Union INTUC. Asif is the district chief of the Chhatra Parishad, the youth wing of the state Congress. Rabbani is a Panchayat member. Congress candidate Chaudhary alleged a TMC-BJP nexus behind the arrests and described the protest as a peaceful demonstration against the deletion of voters’ names. TMC candidate Nazrul Islam rejected the allegation. Before the NIA stepped in, Bengal Police had registered 12 cases and arrested 49 people. These include ISF’s Mothabari candidate Maulana Shahjahan Ali.