Suspended IAS officer K Sivasankar was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday in the sensational gold smuggling case, hours after he lost a legal battle in the Kerala High Court for anticipatory bail, official sources said.

Earlier, soon after the Kerala High Court rejected his anticipatory bail applications, a team of ED officials reached an Ayurveda hospital in Thiruvananthapuram, where Sivasankar was undergoing treatment, and took him into custody. He was later brought in a car to the ED office here for interrogation.

Protests were held at different parts of Kerala, including in front of the secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram, by the opposition parties and their youth wings demanding the resignation of Pinarayi Vijayan, who has been maintaining that his government would not shield anyone involved in the case. The protesters burnt effigies of Vijayan in some places. The National Investigation Agency, Customs and the ED are conducting separate probes into the seizure of gold worth nearly Rs 15 crore from a "diplomatic baggage" of UAE consulate at Thiruvananthapuram airport on July 5. Several people, including two former employees of the UAE consulate in Thiruvananthapuram, Suresh and Sarith PS, have been arrested by the central agencies so far.

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