The Hindu : Front Page : Hyderabad connection to Mumbai blasts

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Sunday, Oct 01, 2006
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Hyderabad connection to Mumbai blasts

Staff Reporter

City resident Naveed arrested by the Mumbai police in connection with the 7/11 blasts. Naveed was close to Faizal Shaik, alleged mastermind of the Mumbai blasts.

HYDERABAD: Hyderabad's link to terrorist activities came to the fore once again on Saturday when a city resident Naveed was arrested by the Mumbai police in connection with the 7/11 blasts.

The Mumbai police team assisted by their counterparts here took Naveed in custody (28) from his rented flat at Neredmet. Sources say Naveed hailed from Mumbai but has been living in the city for the past two years.

The police in Mumbai announced that Naveed was a close confidant of Faizal Shaik, the alleged mastermind of the Mumbai blasts. Faizal Shaik has also been arrested. "It was Naveed who had planted the bombs in Khar railway station," they declared. It is learnt that Naveed left for Mumbai a few days before the attacks were carried out and returned to Hyderabad later.

He earlier worked in GE as a lower level executive. There, he came close to one of his colleagues Swasthik from Ooty. Later, the duo joined a software firm office at Ameerpet. Both of them were sharing a rented flat. Special teams of Hyderabad and Cyberabad police are investigating whether Naveed developed a network of contacts in the city.

They took Swasthik in custody. "Investigation conducted thus far revealed that Swasthik had little role to play with the blasts. But he was in the habit of snorting the ink removing liquid," a detective said. The plainclothes policemen drove to Lake Shore Towers of New Vidyanagar, a middle class locality in Neredmet, around 6.30 p.m.

"Claiming as Naveed's relatives, they asked whether he was in and went away when I said he was yet to come. As soon as Naveed came at 8. p.m., they rounded him up and whisked him away," the apartment watchman's wife Satyamma said. She said Naveed and his roommates used to be close to a woman who was living in a flat on the top floor of the same building and working in a call centre.

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