Kerala - Kozhikode   

Police officials examined before Marad commission

Staff Reporter

Next hearing on November 14

Kozhikode: Several police officers were examined before the Marad Judicial Inquiry Commission here on Wednesday. The commission is investigating the massacre of nine persons at the Marad coastal village in the district on May 2, 2003.

In his deposition before Thomas P. Joseph, commission and District and Sessions Court Judge, K.V. Satheeshan, Deputy Superintendent of Police, Crime Branch Crime Investigation Department, said that four accused in the case relating to a seizure of bombs from inside the Meypayur Juma Masjid in Kozhikode district on December 16, 1996, had then confessed that they had manufactured the explosives at the behest of Kunhahamed Fazi, leader of the Kozhikode-based National Development Front (NDF).

During cross-examination, Mr. Satheeshan said he did not know whether Faizi was a leader or an activist of the NDF. The four accused in the case had been activists of the NDF. Together, there had been nine accused, of which three surrendered before the court. The Kozhikode Fast Track Court Adhoc (I) had acquitted all of them on August 10, 2005.

In his deposition, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Kozhikode city, K. Jayendran, said the funeral of the first accused in a bomb-explosion case investigated by him as the then Circle Inspector of Kuttiyadi had been conducted without the knowledge of the police.

The bombs exploded when the first accused, Majeed; the second accused, Abdul Gafoor; and the third accused, Abdul Salam; were manufacturing them inside the Juma Masjid in Kuttiyadi town. The first accused died in Portland Hospital in Kozhikode. The second was seriously injured.

Based on the statements of the accused, Mr. Jayendran said they had attempted to manufacture the bombs to avenge the killing of Aboobaker, a Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) leader allegedly killed by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh in 1992.

All the accused were led by Ummer Mouvali, the fourth accused. The accused in the murder case had also been acquitted.

K. Sreenivasan, a retired Assistant Commissioner of Police (Traffic), Kozhikode city, who had investigated the case relating to the setting of a Tamil Nadu State-owned bus on fire at the KSRTC bus station, said the accused, P.P. Shamsudheen, had done the crime to protest against the alleged ill-treatment of People's Democratic Party chairman Abdul Nazer Maudany's wife in Coimbatore Central Prison.

Based on the statements of the accused and first information reports, the Kozhikode Anti- Corruption Bureau Circle Inspector K.R. Premachandran said NDF activists had attacked the office of Rashtra Deepika, an evening daily, at Pallikunnu in Kannur on December 10, 2003.

They had attacked the office, destroyed its furniture and assaulted the watchman for publishing a news report on December 6 that that the NDF was involved in the attacks on places of worship, such as Gurumandirams at Thamarakulam, Pavumba, Vallikunnum and other places.

The next sitting of the commission is on November 14.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Police officials examined before Marad commission
`Trial blast held at land owned by NDF in 2001'
Id-ul-Fitr to be celebrated today
Ecology does not end in textbooks here
Russian artistes, main draw of circus
Applications invited

Copyright © 2005, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu