City hand in Malegaon blasts

MYSTERY MAN: According to the ATS, the Mumbai resident had been trained in Pakistan

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The devices and explosives used in the Malegaon blast on September 8 this year were assembled in a godown in the textile town and the bomb was made by a Mumbai-based man who visited the powerloom township in the first week of September, sources in the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) said.

The Mumbai resident had been trained by Al-Badar, a wing of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the police said. “LeT’s training chief Azam Cheema had sent money for this blast and over a dozen people, who are suspected to have links with this blast, from Malegaon are under our radar,’’ a source said.

However, the police are still not sure whether the blast was executed by Al-Badar or the LeT. “We are trying to get information about the place from where the accused got the RDX which was used in all the four bombs and who had smuggled it,’’ sources said. Investigators indicated that a Pakistani is involved who had allegedly entered Malegaon.

An ATS officer, under condition of anonymity, said, “The Mumbai man was trained in Pakistan for bomb-making and assembling devices. He reached Malegaon in the first week of September, stayed there for a couple of days, and after assembling the bomb he returned to Mumbai,’’ a source said.

The ATS claimed the suspect’s motive was to perpetuate communal riots in the powerloom town. When asked why the accused bombed a Muslim cemetery, an officer said, “The planters didn’t know that it was a heavy bomb. They were told that it would only create some terror among the public,’’ a source said.

A team of ATS officers comprising DCP Bawiskar, assistant commissioner Kisan Shengal, inspector Sanjay Khaire and sub inspectors Sunil Mane and Dyaneshwar Ahwari are probing the Malegaon blast case which killed 38 people and injured 297 others. Three bombs planted on cycles went off in a cemetery and the fourth bomb at Mushawerat chowk area in Central Malegaon.

The ATS on Wednesday also booked Shabbir Masiullah on charges of murder, attempt to murder and criminal conspiracy in the Malegaon blast case. He is the second accused to be arrested in the blast case. Noorul-Huda (24) was the first person to be booked on October 30.

The Times of India, November, 3, 2006