Author: Praveen Swami
Publication: The Hindu
Date: September 20, 2008
URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/20/stories/2008092060081200.htm
Introduction: Mohammad Bashir helped teach
Gujarat terrorists bomb-making techniques
* The three played an important role in organising
the serial bombings in New Delhi * They had met Qureshi at least twice in
August to discuss future attacks
Investigators believe that the three terrorists
shot in New Delhi's Jamia Nagar on Friday were key actors in an Uttar Pradesh-based
network which constituted the logistical backbone of the Indian Mujahideen's
nationwide operations.
Police have identified the Indian Mujahideen
operatives killed in the shootout as Azamgarh residents Mohammad Bashir and
Mohammad Fakruddin. A third man who was injured has been identified as Saif
Ahmad, also a resident of Azamgarh.
Police believe the three men, who were located
after an Intelligence Bureau-led operation targeting Indian Mujahideen communications,
played an important role in organising last weekend's serial bombings in New
Delhi.
Last week, The Hindu had broken news that
the three Azamgarh men - whose names were withheld by this newspaper to avoid
compromising the investigation - were being sought in connection with the
New Delhi bombings.
Investigators had been searching for Bashir
ever since the arrest of Sarai Mir-based cleric Abul Bashar Qasmi who, the
Gujarat police alleges, had operational command of the terror cell which carried
out July's bombings in Ahmedabad.
According to Gujarat police investigators,
Bashir, under the supervision of top Indian Mujahideen commander Mohammad
Subhan Qureshi, taught local Indian Mujahideen cadre how to fabricate the
improvised explosive devices used in Ahmedabad. Much of the training, police
sources say, appears to have been carried out with the help of detailed circuit
diagrams which were found in one of the apartments used by the terror cell.
Bashir, the Gujarat police say, also received
the stolen vehicles which were used as car-bombs in Ahmedabad - vehicles that
are thought to have been acquired by Qureshi who, despite the coordinated
efforts of police in five States, is yet to be located.
Late on the afternoon on June 26, Bashir is
believed to left Ahmedabad on a New Delhi-bound train. Qureshi - a highly-trained
computer specialist who is suspected to have authored e-mail manifestos issued
by the Indian Mujahideen after its attacks in Jaipur, Gujarat and New Delhi
- is thought to have left Ahmedabad some two hours later.
Based on the phone records of the alleged
Indian Mujahideen cadre held in Gujarat, the Intelligence Bureau concluded
that Bashir was likely hidden out in safehouses provided by Students Islamic
Movement of India sympathisers in the Jamia Nagar and Okhla areas of south-east
Delhi. Efforts to locate the safehouses, Delhi Police sources said, were initiated
last weekend.
However, these could be located only when
Qasmi was brought to New Delhi and driven around the Jamia Nagar area on Thursday
night.
Qasmi had told Gujarat police investigators
that the three Azamgarh men had met with Qureshi at least twice in August
to discuss future attacks. New Delhi was chosen as a target during these meetings.
But evidence on the critical role of Uttar
Pradesh-based networks in the Indian Mujahideen's operations had in fact been
available ever since early this year, when the names of several of its operatives
emerged in the course of investigations into the December 2007, synchronised
bombing of trial court buildings at Lucknow, Faizabad and Varanasi.
Police found that Jaunpur based Mohammad Khalid
Mujahid and Tariq Kazmi, using explosives provided by Jammu and Kashmir Harkat
ul-Jihad-e-Islami commander Bashir Mir, had coordinated the trial court bombings.
However, protests broke out after the arrests of the two men, leading the
Uttar Pradesh government to order the State police to go slow on operations
directed at SIMI.
Among those who thus escaped arrest was Qasmi.
Indeed, Qasmi's SIMI links had been known to the Uttar Pradesh police since
2006, when he figured in the interrogation of Mohtasin Billa, an engineering
student alleged to have facilitated that year's serial bombings in Hyderabad.
However, Qasmi was only finally held after the Gujarat police obtained a warrant
for his arrest early this month. Police officials believe earlier action could
have disrupted the networks which carried out the Ahmedabad attacks.
Friday's shootings, interestingly, again sparked
off violence in Azamgarh, where local Samajwadi Party activists claimed the
men shot in New Delhi were innocent. Ahmad's father, Sadab Ahmad, is vice-president
of the local unit of the Samajwadi Party. Qasmi's arrest - which took place
after the Gujarat police obtained a judicial warrant, forcing the hand of
their Uttar Pradesh counterparts - had had provoked protests in and around
Sarai Mir, also spearheaded by local politicians of the Samajwadi Party.
