A 9mm pistol and two magazines with 12 cartridges were dug out of a vacant plot in Kasba on Saturday evening.

Police said the arms and ammunition were linked to the plot to gun down Trinamul Congress councillor Sushanta Ghosh in front of his house in Kasba’s Rajdanga on November 15.

“The arms and ammunition were recovered based on statements of Laxman Kumar Sharma, alias Chotu, who was driving the scooter carrying Yuvraj Kumar, who targetted Ghosh, on the pillion,” said an officer.

According to the police, both Kumar and Chotu were carrying arms.

CCTV footage captured the attempt on Ghosh, the councillor of Ward 108 of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation and chairman of Borough XII.

Two men riding a scooter stopped near the spot where Ghosh was talking to two others in front of his house. The pillion rider, later identified as Yuvraj Kumar, got off the two-wheeler and aimed a gun at the councillor. But the gun did not fire.

The two tried to flee on the scooter but Ghosh and his acquaintances grabbed Kumar.

The scooterist fled. He was later identified as Chotu and arrested early on December 3 in Bihar.

“He (Chotu) had disposed of his pistol in a vacant plot and hidden it under soil littered with garbage so that it would be difficult to find,” said an officer in the detective department of Kolkata Police.

Although Kumar had claimed that he had no intention to kill the councillor and brandished the gun only to scare him, the police suspect he was lying.

“Chotu and Kumar both were fully armed. Had they intended to scare Kumar, they would not have come with such preparations. They had been hired to kill the councillor,” an officer said.

Based on Chotu’s statements, the police searched the plot along Bosepukur Road and dug out the arms and ammunition.