Police on Monday arrested another Kurmi leader, Nishikanta Mahato in connection with Friday's attack on junior forest minister Birbaha Hansda who was tailing the convoy of Trinamul general-secretary Abhishek Banerjee in Jhargram.

With this, till Monday, nine persons, including the state president of Adivasi Kurmi Samaj (West Bengal) Rajesh Mahato, have been arrested in connection with the incident. The CID, which took over the case on Sunday night, appealed at a Jhargram court for 14 days in remand for seven out of the nine arrested.

The CID's plea got rejected. All nine arrested persons were sent in judicial custody till June 12.

The arrested Kurmi leaders claimed they were innocent and demanded a CBI probe.

"We don't believe in violence and no one from our community was involved in the attack. We also want a CBI probe to reveal the truth and find out the actual culprits. It was a conspiracy to stop our movement (to demand ST tag for the community)," said Rajesh Mahato, the arrested Kurmi leader, and an English teacher who was also transferred from a Kharagpur school to Cooch Behar after Friday's incident, in what his followers believe was an act of vengeance.

"We won't sit idle.... We are planning to move higher courts against the transfer order of Rajesh Mahato as it was thoroughly illegal and an act of vengeance," said Suman Mahato, a central committee member of Ghaghor Ghera Committee, a platform of Kurmi outfits active in Jungle Mahal to demand ST status.

Kurmi community leaders have decided not to let any political parties use their walls for any poll campaign till they get the ST tag.

Hundreds of people from the community on Monday assembled in front of the Jhargram court to protest against the arrests of their community leaders and marched in Jhagram town demanding a central agency probe.

Protest rallies were reported from pockets of Jungle Mahal like Bankura, Purulia and West Midnapore. Kurmi people also agitated in other districts like Malda.

On Friday, around 400 Kurmi workers allegedly mounted an attack on the car of Hansda, a tribal leader, and a dozen of Trinamul workers who were tailing the convoy of Abhishek, who was visiting Jhargram as part of his mega outreach drive Trinamuley Nabo Jowar.

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee, at a rally in West Midnapore's Salboni on Saturday, said she believed her "Kurmi brothers" were not involved in the attack and blamed the BJP, saying that in the name of the Kurmis, the party resorted to violence and tried to attack Abhishek.

On Monday, people of the Kurmi community said despite Mamata's clean chit, her police arrested Kurmi persons, not BJP leaders.

Abhishek, who was in West Midnapore on Monday, met leaders of the tribal outfit Bharat Jakat Majhi Pargana Mahal.

Tribal people in Jungle Mahal called a strike on June 8 against the Kurmi demand for the ST tag.