The joint security forces Monday raided a camp used by banned Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) leader Kishanji in West Bengal's West Midnapore district, but the rebel leader yet again managed to escape.

Acting on a tip-off, the forces raided two Maoist camps in the Pirakata jungles, and found Kishanji's hideout in one of them, District Superintendent of Police Manoj Verma, who led the raiding party, said.

'Kishanji had set up base there. But he fled before we could reach him. Or maybe he had fled a couple of days earlier,' Verma told IANS.

Kishanji has so far eluded the police five times in the last few months.

'We found that bullets were being made there. There were a lot of landmine-making materials like gunpowder,' Verma said.

He said that Prashanta Mahato, a front-ranking Maoist leader and the main accused in the abduction of Sankarail police station officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta, has been arrested from his jungle hideout.

In a daring daylight raid, about 40 Leftwing extremists stormed the Sankrail police station last October, killing two policemen and abducting the officer-in-charge Dutta. He was freed after two days in captivity.