SIMI man behind Malegaon blasts

Noor-ul-Huda, a worker in an inverter unit, is produced in a Malegaon court on Monday

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The state police claims it has solved the September 8 Malegaon blasts case with the arrest on Monday of a former activist of the banned organisation SIMI (Students Islamic Movement of India).

Director-General of Police P S Pasricha announced on Monday that the police had arrested Noor-ul-Huda (24), a labourer in a battery unit at Malegaon and a former SIMI member, in connection with the blasts that killed 38 people and injured 297. The DGP also said that the owner of the battery unit, Shabbir Masiullah (34), would be booked in the case. Masiullah is in the custody of the Mumbai crime branch which arrested him for his SIMI links.

Pasricha has, however, refused to reveal anything more. All he was willing to say was that the motive was to create communal riots.

The Times of India, October 31, 2006

Huda’s arrest fails to answer questions

ATS DRAWS A BLANK

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: Despite keeping alleged Malegaon bomb planter Noor-ul-Huda in custody for over 20 days, the anti terrorism squad (ATS) is yet to get answers to several questions dogging the case. The ATS remains tightlipped about Huda’s specific role and who the other conspirators, bomb planters and the financier were.

Twenty four-year-old Huda, a labourer, has been on the police radar since 2001 when he was arrested for the first time for his alleged association with the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI).

His arrest on October 9 did not surprise many. Most residents claimed Huda was always the ‘usual suspect’ and a senior police officer was after him though he would report to the police station regularly. Sources said whenever tension prevailed in the powerloom town, the police would detain him for several days.

TOI visited Huda’s 15x10 sq ft house in Jaffer Nagar. The third among nine siblings, Huda finished secondary school and joined his father, Shamsud Duha, in the powerloom business. The father-son duo would work in a powerloom unit and earn around Rs 800 a week which was not enough for the family. “Six month ago he told me that he would work in a battery unit and earn some more. He was employed at Shabbir Masiullah’s factory. Though he had disassociated himself from SIMI, the police would detain him frequently,’’ said Duha.

The police said the mud found in a dummy bomb and the mud from Masiullah’s factory contained RDX. The unit closed after Masiullah’s arrest on August 11 and the Malegaon blast took place almost a month later. Therefore, Huda could not have entered Masiullah’s factory. The police were also yet to establish who financed the blast. The cops have avoided questions about the mastermind, the meeting points, the bomb manufacturers, smuggling of RDX etc. Masiullah’s brother Jameel said his brother used to manufacture batteries and inverters and would use chemicals and therefore the mud at the factory could be different as it could have absorbed the chemicals lying around. However, the police refused to buy the theory. Masiullah, who stayed in Saudi Arabia between 1991 and 1996, separated from his family and was staying with his wife and four children. After returning from the Gulf, he started Gazal Store, an imitation jewellery shop, but later rented it out and started selling batteries and inverters.

Meanwhile, the ATS want to take Huda to Gujarat, Aurangabad and Madhya Pradesh for investigation. He was sent to police custody till November 3.

Masiullah was also arrested for his alleged links with SIMI. He is also accused of going to Pakistan via Dubai for terror training two years ago. Masiullah is also a friend of Govandi resident Mohammed Ali, arrested in the 7/11 case.

The Times of India, October 31, 2006

Malegaon accused trained in Pak

The Malegaon blasts killed 38 people

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: SIMI activist Noor-ul-Huda, who was arrested in connection with the Malegaon blasts on Monday, is a high school drop-out, was first arrested by the Malegaon police on October 9 and booked under various sections of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). He was later taken to Bangalore for lie detector and narco analysis tests.

“We received a tip-off about Huda’s involvement in the blasts and he spilled the beans after he was arrested,’’ DGP P S Pasricha said.

Police sources said Huda confessed to planting a dummy bomb on the staircase of the Mohammedia Masjid in central Malegaon on September 12. The ‘bomb’ contained mud and RDX. Later when the police collected samples of mud from the factory of Shabbir Masiullah, where Huda was working, they contained traces of RDX, Pasricha claimed. “We have witnesses and scientific evidence in this case,’’ the DGP said, adding that revealing any more information would hamper investigations.

According to sources, the police are looking for three other persons who parked the bomb-laden cycles and are trying to collect information about those who manufactured the bombs.

According to the police, the blasts conspiracy was hatched eight months ago and the RDX was smuggled into Malegaon by another module. The police said that at least two to three modules were involved in the blasts. Masiullah (34) is allegedly the brain behind the blasts while Huda is said to have carried out his orders.

The bombs that were used in Malegaon were made in Masiullah’s factory. Masiullah is also accused of going to Pakistan for terror training.

“Huda told us that he knew of other planters but not their names. At least half a dozen people are involved in this case and we are collecting evidence against them. Several accused belong to areas outside Malegaon,’’ a police officer said.

When Masiullah’s factory closed after his arrest on August 11, Huda started working in a powerloom unit. He would also report to the police several times a week.

After the 7/11 train bombings in Mumbai, Huda was picked up from Malegaon and detained at the Mumbai crime branch’s Unit VII office between August 4 and August 14. The crime branch released him after it failed to find anything suspicious pertaining to him.

The Times of India, October 31, 2006

One booked in Malegaon fake bomb case

Mateen Hafeez & Shibu Thomas I TNN
Mumbai: The police recently booked powerloom labourer Noorul Huda, 23, for allegedly planting a fake bomb in a mosque in Malegaon on September 14. Huda had on October 8 also been arrested for being a member of the banned
Simi outfit, but he was granted bail in that case. The new booking allows the police to keep Huda in custody.

On September 14, two boxes were found on the staircase of the Mohammedia mosque in central Malegaon, creating panic in the city. Sniffer dogs confirmed the presence of explosives, but after eight hours the police found “mud mixed with firecracker powder’’ in the boxes. A case of mischief to create panic was registered against an unknown person with the Malegaon police.

On Sunday, Rajvardhan, superintendent of police, Nashik (rural), said, “We have booked Huda in the hoax bomb case. The chemical analysis report of the mixture stated that it was firecracker powder mixed with mud. He has been sent to police custody till October 26.’’

Azeem Khan, lawyer for Huda, said, “The judge granted Huda bail in the Simi case and soon the police arrested him in the Mohammedia mosque case. I didn’t have the report of the chemical analysis of the hoax bomb with me. On that day, the NSG squad had come and examined it.’’

Meanwhile, Huda asked the Bombay high court on Monday to restrain the police from conducting narco-analysis, brain-mapping and lie-detector tests on him. The police sought to conduct the tests in connection with the September 8 blasts in Malegaon.

Huda’s advocate Amin Solkar said his client had not even been shown as arrested in the Malegaon blast case. Solkar added that Huda had already undergone a round of tests at Bangalore.

Vacation judge Justice Anup Mohta refused to grant a stay, while adjourning the hearing till Wednesday.

The Times of India, October 25, 2006

Court asks Nashik police to look for missing informer

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Friday instructed the Nashik (rural) police to search for Abrar Ahmed who disappeared under mysterious circumstances last week. Ahmed’s relatives suspect he has been picked up by the Malegaon police in connection with the serial bomb blasts on September 8 in which 38 people were killed and 297 injured. The family filed a habeas corpus petition which was heard by the division bench of Justice J N Patel and Justice Roshan Dalvi on Friday.

he court also instructed the family that once Ahmed was traced, they should file another affidavit. Ahmed (35), a resident of Islampura area in central Malegaon, disappeared last week. TOI, on October 18, reported about the circumstances in which he went missing.

Ahmed, who repairs inverters and batteries, was on his way home on his scooter on September 8 when he was stopped at a nakabandi by the police. According to relatives, the policeman checked his dickey and found inverters and wires in it. They took him to the police station where he was interrogated. “The policemen asked him to repair several batteries there and then took him to Nashik where he was again asked to use his expertise and repair a few inverters. He was then set free,’’ a relative said.

According to sources, Ahmed and his wife were then ‘gifted’ expensive mobile phones by a senior officer in Malegaon who was alleged to have distributed cellphones to several informants. Ahmed, who separated from the rest of his family eight months ago, called up from an STD booth in Indore on Wednesday and asked his relatives to call him on that number after an hour. “The family tried calling him on the number for hours but no one answered. We suspect that somebody is forcing him to stay away,’’ a relative said.

However, the police denied that they had picked him up. “We don’t have anyone in our custody. We are probing the case and will soon make a breakthrough,’’ said P K Jain, inspector general (Nashik range).

Meanwhile, the Mumbai crime branch last month arrested Shabbir Masiullah (36) on charges of his alleged association with the banned Students’ Islamic Movement of India. Masiullah is also a resident of Malegaon and is in the business of selling inverters. A 25-year-old labourer, Noorul Huda, was also arrested two weeks ago by the Malegaon police for his association with SIMI. The Malegaon police wants to subject him to narco-analysis. Huda was employed with Masiullah, a police officer said.

The Times of India, October 21, 2006

Case that became a benchmark for cops

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The Khwaja Yunus case, some say, has become a cautionary tale for policemen who believe in using strong-arm tactics for interrogation.

The alleged custodial death and the subsequent probe by the CID has brought as many as 37 men from the Mumbai police force under the scanner. Several of them have been arrested and released on bail ahead of the trial; they have all been stripped of their posts. Others have been transferred out of the elite crime branch for misuse of powers, and still others, apprehending judicial action, have acquired anticipatory bail.

Not a single accused in the Ghatkopar bomb blast case, in which Yunus was a suspect, was subjected to forensic tests. The police had merely relied on interrogations in custody, which yielded confessions that could in turn be presented in the POTA court. This along with circumstantial evidence became the basis of a case, which was eventually thrown out by the POTA court and questioned by the media.

For the 40,000-strong force, the case now serves as a benchmark, a constant reminder of the need to use “tactful interrogation techniques’’ and shun methods of third degree physical torture. Increasingly, the force has begun to rely on forensic tests and psychological methods to make a custodial accused sing. For instance, in probing the plot behind the 7/11 train bombings, four of the key accused have already been subjected to forensic scrutiny.

One of the investigators of the Zaveri Bazaar blasts conspiracy admitted that the Yunus saga has indeed led to increased reliance on forensic tests. “Earlier, police was dependent on circumstantial evidence and statements. Now we have facilities for brain-mapping, narco analysis, lie detection, etc. All those arrested for heinous crimes like acts of terrorism or rape are now subjected to such tests to get to the truth,’’ he said.

Techniques to coerce an accused into revealing details of a crime have also evolved through interaction with international law enforcement agencies. The methods used to break a suspect’s resolve can be subtle enough not to leave behind telltale signs of torture or cause serious injuries. “Sometimes they don’t let the accused sleep for days together, or they use battery-generated electric current to inflict shocks. There is no risk to life in these methods but they can slowly break a person,’’ said ex-IPS officer Y P Singh. Threats are also made that family members could be implicated if he does not fall in line.

The shift from brutal methods of interrogation has also been aided by civil society. An officer, who served on many highprofile operations, admitted “there is a lot of pressure from human rights commission, from superiors and media to stop using hard methods of interrogation. Who will investigate a case at the cost of his service, reputation and life?’’

UNSAFE CUSTODY

January 2006: Bombay high court asks the state government to submit a report on what it has done to implement the recommendations of the National Human Rights Commission on dealing with custodial deaths. This is in response to a PIL in which the petitioners argue that Maharashtra has recorded the highest number of custodial deaths in the country.

April 2006: High court orders a second postmortem to be conducted on the body of Premnath Rao, who died in custody at the Agripada police station. Then it orders a magisterial inquiry into the incident after Rao’s relatives plead that injuries on his body suggest that he could not have committed suicide in the lock-up, as the police had claimed.

December 1996: Laxman Somnath Verma dies at a jail in Kalyan. Later, the NHRC looks into the death and observes that Verma had died due to negligence. Verma had been suffering from tuberculosis and succumbed to the disease unattended since there was no doctor in the jail.

The Times of India, October 21, 2006

Doubts still linger over 7/11 evidence - WHAT’S THE TRUTH?

Mateen Hafeez I TNN
Mumbai: The Anti-Terrorism Squad, which is probing the July 11 train bombing case, discharged three of the 16 suspects on October 13 saying there was “no direct evidence’’ against them. However, the police claimed to have collected “enough physical evidence’’ against the other accused, who were booked for conspiracy, manufacturing and planting the bombs.

The released men were Mumtaz Chaudhuri, Khalid Shaikh and alleged Al-Badar divisional commander Akmal Hashmi. However, sceptics have raised questions with regard to some of the “physical evidence’’ the police are relying on for their case.

The first piece of evidence the police laid their hands on was 500 gm of black powder from suspect Kamal Ahmed’s residence in Madhubani district of Bihar. But Kamal’s mother said the powder was unused cement that had been bought three years ago during house repairs. She said the powder had turned black over time. But the chemical analysis the authorities ordered said the powder was RDX.

The ATS also said it seized sulphuric acid, hydrogen peroxide and acetone from unani physician Tanvir Ahmed’s personal locker at the M H Saboo Siddik Hospital in Mumbai. An ATS officer had called Tanvir an expert in using chemicals to make bombs. But Mumbai police chief A N Roy told TOI that Tanvir had not been taught how to make bombs with chemicals and had, therefore, asked Zameer Shaikh, another accused, to bring the formula with him from Pakistan so he could learn it. Zameer had gone there for arms training soon after Tanvir had been kicked out from there for questioning LeT strategy.

The police also claimed that they seized 26,000 riyals sent from Saudi Arabia through the hawala route to Faisal Shaikh, the alleged western Indian commander of the LeT, who is also arrested in the case. However, sources pointed out hawala money usually received in India is in rupees.

The police also said they recovered a few pressure-cooker whistles and gaskets from the sand near the Mira Road railway tracks. An ATS officer said Faisal had revealed that the cookers were used in the blasts and that he had separated the whistles and gaskets and tried to throw them away. “But we recovered them,’’ said an officer.

But the blasts were on July 11, Faisal was picked up on July 16 and handed over to the ATS on July 27. He was taken for narco-tests in the first week of September. The whistles and gaskets would have been in the area for one-and-a-half months before the ATS traced them. Also, Faisal had been staying in Bandra at the time of the blasts, which is several suburbs away from Mira Road.

On August 22, the ATS shot down Mohammed Ali alias Abu Osama, an alleged Pakistani national, and said that it recovered maps of Mumbai, Maharashtra and the world, an AK-47, 18 empty cartridges, 72 live cartridges, a red diary and 1.5kg of black powder from him. The powder, according to chemical analysis, was RDX.

The police said that Ali was one of the Pakistanis who perpetrated the blasts, but while the others had fled, Ali’s Pakistani instructor had asked him to return to Mumbai and hide in a deserted Antop Hill building. However, the police cannot say why Ali was asked to return to the city. ATS chief K P Raghuvanshi was unavailable for comment.

The Times of India, October 20, 2006