Chennai, Mar 8 (UNI) The State Q Branch Police today arrested three persons, including a ruling DMK functionary, for alleged involvement in a hawala transaction reportedly done by a Sri Lankan refugee at Tiruchirapalli for procuring weapon materials and smuggling them through sea to Sri Lanka.

Q Branch Police sources told UNI a team from Tiruchirapalli arrived here on Wednesday and picked up three men from Mannady in the city after they made some arrests in the district.

The arrested were identified as DMK functionary Idayathullah alias Bargad, Pratheepan and Bageerathan.

The police hunt started as soon as they picked up one Arunaseelan, a Lankan refugee with Rs ten lakh in cash that was believed to be a part of major hawala transaction conducted for procuring iron balls and other weapon materials on behalf of one Sathesh, a businessman from Lanka.

Along with Arunaseelan, the police also arrested one Rahulan alias Anthony in connection with the hawala transaction.

The Preliminary investigations revealed the arrested used to store the procured materials at a soap company godown in Perambalur.

Based on this, a police party raided the godown and seized four tonne of iron balls and arrested two employees of the soap company.

The owner of the company, Ramesh Kumar, went underground.

However, the arrested godown employees told police that Ramesh Kumar had escaped to Chennai and was staying in Mannady with a DMK member and planning to escape from Tamil Nadu with two other Sri Lankans.

Based on this information, the Q Branch Police in the city arrested the DMK party functionary and the two Lankans.

The police also seized cash and cell phones from the arrested men. However, Ramesh Kumar managed to give the slip, the sources added.

UNI