- The 20 arrested by Mumbai police are involved in the Hyderabad, Surat, Amedabad and Delhi blasts
- Riyaz Bhatkal alias Roshan Jamal identified as key man behind blasts
- Bhatkal reports to ISI operative
- Peerbhoy and his associate Mubin Kadar Shaikh sent terror e-mails
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- Abu Bashar, the mastermind held for Ahmedabad blasts by Gujarat police.
- Abdul Subhan Tauqeer, identified earlier as the man who sent e-mails
- The police briefings that said Tauqeer was responsible for the blasts
- The role of those killed by Delhi police in the Jamia Nagar encounter
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Of the 20 in custody, 11 were picked up in Mumbai, Pune and Mangalore over the last week. The rest were held from across the country in what police described as "the biggest manhunt", which began in mid-September and involved 30 officers of Mumbai's crime branch in collaboration with the Intelligence Bureau (IB). Those who took part claim this was the closest any operation had come to breaking the Indian Mujahideen network. "Several Muslims played a significant role in helping nab these men. We were working with help from the community," Rakesh Maria, joint commissioner (crime), told Outlook.
The trail now leads to Riyaz Bhatkal, alias Roshan Jamal, who the cops claim is a founding member of the Indian Mujahideen and "reports directly to Amir Raza, who is holed up in Pakistan" and is the key accused in the 2001 attack on the US consulate in Calcutta. Police now say Raza is the prime mover and architect of the Indian Mujahideen; they have carefully avoided the word "mastermind", which brought them much ridicule after police forces from various states made contradicting claims about different "masterminds".
But they do say that to smash Indian Mujahideen completely, they need to get Raza. "This story is not over yet," says police commissioner Hasan Gafoor. Interrogations have also thrown up the name of "Major Atiq", possibly with isi, said to have been present at the training camps for the Indian Mujahideen.
Sadiq Shaikh, arrested on September 23, attended two such training camps in 2004-05. He gave the Crime Branch the lead to modules in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Pune and Mumbai. Shaikh was the contact between Bhatkal, the bomb planters and the hackers, who sent out terror e-mails. Shaikh is originally from Azamgarh but lives in Cheetah Camp in central Mumbai. He is a software professional with a computer management firm, which is the only life he led, according to his family. But what raised suspicions are his having attended office on holidays, his furtive phone calls, and his absence for about a week around the time the September 13 Delhi blasts took place. It was a colleague at work who tipped off police. Usman Afzal, who stole the Navi Mumbai cars used in the Ahmedabad and Surat blasts, also confirmed Shaikh's involvement, the Mumbai crime branch says. Sustained interrogation of Shaikh led to police unravelling the Indian Mujahideen network.
Among those in police custody are computer professionals who oversaw the logistics of the attacks, linking up Shaikh, the bomb makers, the bomb planters and drivers. Among those arrested are Pune-based Mohammed Mansoor Asgar Peerbhoy and Mubin Kadar Shaikh, who are said to have drafted and sent the pre-attack terror e-mails, designed the Indian Mujahideen logo and hacked into unsecured Wi-fi connections.
Whodunit? A blast site in Ahmedabad
The 31-year-old Peerbhoy, a software engineer for an MNC and earning Rs 19 lakh annually, has been the focus of much attention. "He is highly qualified and belongs to a good, educated family. He and two others were trained at an anti-hacking training camp in Hyderabad, for which IM paid Rs 70,000 per person," said Maria. The cops have tracked Rs 26 lakh sent from Dubai and Abu Dhabi through hawala for Indian Mujahideen operations. A Kurla trader who shares space with a closed SIMI office is also under the scanner.
Raids in Mangalore resulted in the recovery of five laptops, three CPU units, three pen drives, sleep-inducing pills, anaesthetic injections, two bullet-proof jackets, countrymade revolvers, radio and Wi-fi signal detectors, wireless routers, jehadi literature and CDs with provocative material. Sources say Peerbhoy may turn approver in the cases but his family has steadfastly refused to accept the police story.
Even if this new theory on part of Mumbai police is accepted as plausible, there are questions. What was the role of Abu Bashar, arrested as key accused in the Ahmedabad blasts case? How does the module coordinated by Abdul Subhan Tauqeer, earlier touted as the e-mail writer and hacker, fit into this? Crime Branch officials say they are after Tauqeer but his larger-than-real image is "mostly a media creation".
The Tauqeer hunt was largely on the motivation of the Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS), which is in competition with the Crime Branch. Similarly, the Delhi encounter in Jamia Nagar, sources say, was a botched operation by the Delhi police, whose help had been enlisted by Mumbai Crime Branch to crack the Indian Mujahideen module. "We would have arrested them, not killed them in an encounter," says an official who was on the team that went to Delhi.
Even as Mumbai cops receive accolades, a senior officer rues their inability to crack the financial structure of the terror group. Members of the group have reportedly shown themselves so dedicated to "the cause" that the hawala money was carefully used—no leakages.
It was perhaps pure chance that the Crime Branch could foil an attack. At least Navratri and the Zubin Mehta concert passed off without an incident.
