Unperturbed by a series of acquittals of innocent persons falsely implicated in heinous ‘terror’ cases, the sleuths of Delhi Police (DP) made fresh claims of arresting 7 (6+1) alleged terror operatives from various places of the country. Police said by these arrests three cases of Delhi Jama Masjid firing, Pune bakery and Bangalore stadium blasts have been cracked. DP alleged that accused persons are members of the mysterious Indian Mujahedeen (IM) module; put together by illusive Yasin Bhatkal alias Yasin Ahmad Siddibappa alias Shahrukh alias Imran alias Asif etc. Though Yasin’s name has cropped up in several cases, he is yet none of his name has been arrested. DP has announced a reward of Rs. 15 Lac on his head. One among arrested is said be a resident of Karachi.
Police has also claimed to have recovered two AK-47 rifles one 9 mm pistol, their cartridges and various type of explosive substances along with detonators, fake Indian currency of Rs 2 lakh, and other incriminating material.
Union Home Minister P Chidambaram confirmed that the alleged IM operatives were suspected of having a hand in the blasts of German Bakery Pune (February 13, 2010), Chinnaswamy Stadium Banglore (April 17, 2010) and Jama Masjid Delhi (September 19, 2010) firing. Earlier in May 2010 Maharashtra ATS has arrested a young man Abdul Samad Bhatkal in a dramatic way as he arrived from Dubai at Mangalore Airport. Mr. Chidambram was immediately informed of the “prized catch in Bakery case” who in turn generously praised the Police. But the shine of the storey faded within hours. ATS made a bogus case and showed him arrested in a 2009 arms seizure case. The judge observed there is no evidence against Samad and that even the ATS had never shown Samad as a "wanted accused" in the arms case and freed him on bail.
Yasin is said to be “kingpin” in all these cases. It seems that DP did not checked with their counter parts in Maharashtra, before making this claim, as Pune Police had already crowned one Mirza Himayat Inayat Beg (29) as the kingpin of Bakery case and back on July 16, 2011, the court of ADJ N P Dhote had framed charges against Beg. DP has accused one Qateel Siddiqi also in Pune case but his name is not in the list of other six suspects who are yet to be arrested.
Qateel Siddiqi, 27, and Gauhar Aziz Khomani, 31 — were picked up in Delhi on November 22 and 23 respectively. Two others — Gayur Ahmad Jamali, 21 and Mohammad Adil, 40, were arrested in Bihar’s Darbhanga and Madhubani on November 24 and 25 respectively. Irshad Khan, 52, of Samastipur, Bihar, and Abdur Rahman, 19, of Darbhanga, were arrested in Chennai on November 27. Siddiqi, Khomani and Jamali too belong to Darbhanga, police said. Four others, from Madhubani, are on the police’s radar.
Siddiqi — who police said was also known as Sajjan, Sajan, Javed and Shahjada Salim — was the first to be arrested. He was picked up from near Anand Vihar bus terminal (AVBT). A pistol with cartridges, and the fake currency notes, two fake passports, a forged identity card of the NCC, and a fake driving license were allegedly recovered from his person.
His “interrogation” produced the name of Yasin Bhatkal, and led to the arrest of Khomani, Jamali, a Pakistani Adil alias Ajmal and Shoeb from Madhubani. Police said Adil had travelled to Delhi on the instructions of the founders of the IM — the Shahbandari brothers of Bhatkal, Riyaz and Iqbal. Raids in Chennai on November 27 led to the arrest of Irshad Khan of Samastipur who lived in Delhi, and Abdur Rahman of Darbhanga, police said.
As narrated by the police, the serial arrests are the result of chance arrest of one Siddiqui from AVBT in Delhi and all arrests are made on the basis of “interrogations” and “information” revealed by the arrested people. We can only hope that this is not a repetition of Malegaon where nine innocent persons were pushed behind bars and case of terror slapped on them at the strength of “confessions” made by one Abrar Ahmad, who turned out to be a petty informer of police. Mharashtra ATS kept him in illegal custody for over 20 days. He was made “approver”, however he retracted in the court and informed the judge that he was coerce to confess under threats.
It seems that Delhi Police was in haste to narrate half backed story to overshadow the embarrassment of indictment made by a court in a terror case only 3 days before.
HuJI militant let off by Delhi court
PTI reported on November 27, 2011 that the court of ASJ P. K. Jain of Delhi let off an alleged HuJI “terrorist” Abdur Rehman and observed "I am of considered opinion that the prosecution has failed to prove the guilt of the accused beyond the shadow of reasonable doubt."
A detailed press release signed by Mr. Alok Kumar, DCP, Special Cell, on 22.5.2005 said: The team of Special Cell led by Inspector MC Sharma under the supervision of Shri S K Yadav, ACP has apprehended one Pak trained HUJI militant namely Mohd Iqbal @ Abdur Rehman from New Delhi Railway Station.” It was claimed that, “The arrested militant had been sent to Delhi by top commanders of HuJI with the nefarious task of causing bomb blasts in the capital. During the follow up action, large quantity of explosive material was recovered.”
The Police Commissioner said, “Interrogation of previously apprehended terrorists and other sources revealed that the Pak based terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT) in league with Bangladeshi terrorist outfit Harkat Ul Jehadi Islami (HuJI ) had jointly committed many terrorist activities in India in the recent past. Information was received from Central Intelligence Agency that Qamar @ Nata, Commander of HuJI in Bangladesh is planning to send some trained terrorists of HUJI in India for causing blasts in the crowded places in Delhi. In order to develop this information and to thwart the terrorist attack in Delhi sources were deployed, in Delhi, border areas of West Bengal and technical surveillance was also mounted.”
The statement claimed, “On 21.05.2008, specific information was received that a HuJI militant with code name Abdur Rehman has entered into India through Indo-Bangladesh border and would arrive in Delhi. Accordingly, a trap was laid …. and Iqbal @ Abdur Rehman (Aged 31 yrs) r/o Muzaffarnagar, UP was apprehended” The police also claimed recovery of “Three Kgs of RDX, one timer and five electronic detonators” from D-block in Janakpuri, Delhi” from a hideout revealed by Iqbal during interrogation. The story goes on explaining links of the accused and his activities during last several years and his contacts in Bangladesh and Pakistan.
This shows the set patron of our Police regarding source of information; “interrogation” and inputs by unspecified “Central Intelligence Agency”, “specific information regarding the movement without mentioning specific source.” All cases, involving some Muslim names, are fabricated in the same fashion. I am not sure if it could be called “modus operendie” of the Police in criminal act of implicating innocent persons in anti-National heinous crimes. Ditto narration was used in FIR’s filed against social and political activists who were arrested during Internal Emergency in 1975.
After three and half year, the court let Rehman off doubting the authenticity of the very information and noted that the so-called secret information was not even recorded anywhere. The court observed, “It is difficult to digest that police officers do not record the secret information anywhere but remember it so well that they can reproduce it even after a period of three years as happened in this case," the court said.
In its charge sheet, the police claimed at Rehman's instance recovery of three kgs of RDX, detonators and timers, buried near a mosque at Janakpuri in West Delhi. DP said Rehman had received these contrabands from one Guru, an active HuJI module in Delhi in 2007.
The court, however, rejected this claim saying Guru was never arrested by the police. Even his sketch was not produced in the court which it claimed was circulated for his arrest. Doubting the very existence of Guru, the court said, "If there was no Guru, where was the question of receiving detonators from him."
Regarding the Police claim that the explosives were buried in 2007, the court said, “There was no evidence to show that Rehman was in Delhi during that period,” and that, “the police did not probe if Rehman ever worked in the mosque.”
The court also said "it might be possible that alleged Guru might have buried the explosives and accused Rehman came to know about it. He cannot be said to be in its conscious possession of explosive", adding that the police handled the material recovered without gloves and the recovery was not even video-graphed.
The Police had claimed that a Bangladesh-based HuJI 'commander' Qamar alias Nata had earlier plotted to trigger blasts in Delhi through Pakistan-trained LeT militants. This information was again attributed to interrogation of one Jalaluddin, arrested by UP Police in connection with the Varanasi blasts. However it may be noted that Varanasi blast investigation is still inconclusive.
In a similar case in August a Delhi High Court Bench comprising justices S Ravindra Bhat and G P Mittal had dismissed Delhi Police appeal against the acquittal of one Ubaid of Srinagar. Police has accused him of being a terror outfit “Al-Badr”. He was let of by trial court in last February as Police investigation was not found satisfactory and evidence produced unreliable.
Story of 7 terror suspects: “cops framed them”
In a more embracing case A Delhi Court had ordered stern action against police officials in an “encounter” case and acquitted all seven accused of terrorism and held that the encounter story was totally false.
Declaring its verdict on Feb 10, 2011, the court of ASJ Virender Bhat acquitted Saqib, Bashir, Nazir Sofi, G. M. Dar, A. M. Bhat, A. Q. Khan and B. K. Singh, arrested in July 2005. The court said, “The encounter, did not take place at all. An absolutely fake encounter has been projected. The story of the encounter was carefully scripted in the office of Special Staff, Delhi Police, Dhaula Kuan, by its main author Sub-Inspector Ravinder Tyagi with the assistance of sub-inspectors Nirakar, Charan Singh and Mahender Singh”.
Coming down heavily on the officials involved in the ‘operation’, the court directed the Delhi Police Commissioner to initiate an inquiry against them. “All these four police officers have acted in advancement of their self-interests in total disregard to the demands of their solemn duty. These police officers, whose duty was to protect and safeguard citizens, have turned persecutors and tormentors,” the court noted in its order.
Describing them as “black sheep” that bring disrepute to the police department, the court said there cannot be any crime more serious than an officer of the law framing an innocent citizen in a false criminal case. “Such tendency in police officers should not be viewed or dealt with lightly. It needs to be curbed with a stern hand. Such black sheep, who are out to defame and bring into disrepute the whole police force, need to be identified from the whole flock and taken to task,” said the court.
The police had claimed that the accused — Saqib Rehman, Nazir Sofi, Gulam Moinuddin Dar and Bashir Ahmed Shah — were arrested following a shoot-out near the Gurgaon-Delhi road on July 1, 2005. When the four were reportedly prevented from fleeing, they allegedly opened fire on the police.
The police also claimed that an army combat uniform, fake currency amounting to Rs 50,000 and a sketch of the Palam Air Force station were recovered from their possession. In the charge sheet, police claimed that the accused persons had disclosed their affiliation to the ISI of Pakistan.
It was also alleged that based on their interrogation, the police had arrested three others and recovered a huge amount of fake currency notes, an AK-47 assault rifle, several magazines, cartridges and hand grenades from the accused.
Judge tore apart every piece of evidence that the prosecution had produced: the fake army uniform had been made by a tailor in the Delhi Cantt area who was a stock witness of the police; the grenades that were supposedly recovered were not produced before the court.
The judge ordered that the police party involved in the false frame up should be tried—that an FIR should be filed and a departmental enquiry should be instituted against them. The Judge also ordered the judgment to be treated as a complaint against the police officer by the concerned magistrate. However no action has yet been taken against errant officials as an appeal has been filed in High Court. (To be concluded) (Filed on 19-12-2011)
Email: syyedagha@hotmail.com
Writer is Gen. Sec. Forum for Civil Rights