Jharkhand terror suspect taken to Delhi

A terror suspect, who was arrested in Jharkhand and on whose tip-off his two associates were arrested in the national capital, was handed over to Delhi Police on two days’ transit remand by a court here, Jharkhand police said Thursday.

“Pir Mama was handed over to Delhi Police on two days’ transit remand by a Hazaribagh court,” a police official told IANS. However, a Jammu and Kashmir Police official identified him as Tauseef Ahmad Peer and the other two as Ahtisham Malik and Shafqat Ahmad.

Mama, living in Hazaribagh’s Pelawal area, was arrested two days ago.

Meanwhile, in a press conference in New Delhi, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Special Cell) Arun Kampani said: “Peer, a resident of Sopore in north Kashmir, was to go to Pakistan for training.”

According to Kampani, Peer was aware of the plans of the two Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militants, whose arrests were announced Wednesday, to strike in New Delhi.

Addressing a press conference here to present his ministry’s monthly report for February, Home Minister P.Chidambaram Wednesday announced that a LeT-sponsored module had been busted in Delhi in an operation jointly carried out by national agencies and a couple of state police forces and two people arrested by the Delhi Police.

He also clarified that the module was not targeting VIPs in the national capital, but was planning to carry out explosions in crowded areas of the national capital.

Meanwhile, a police source told IANS that Jharkhand Police provided some inputs to Delhi Police based on the interrogation of Pir, and based on that, two terrorists were arrested in Delhi.

In Srinagar, Inspector General of Police, Kashmir, S.M. Sahai said that the three’s arrest was the result of coordinated pooling of intelligence by police of Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand and Delhi.

He said Malik had been on the radar of the state Police for quite sometime.

“He had gone to Pakistan and ever since he was on our radar. We were keeping a close watch on his activities and his arrest along with two other persons has been a result of coordinated efforts of J&K police, Jharkhand Police and the Delhi Police,” said Sahai.

Sahai, however, said that the latest module unearthed through the arrest of the three persons was not a large one.

“It is a small module and it is only a very few number of the local youths who are being lured by the LeT now,” he said.