The Hindu : Front Page : Al-Badr terrorist plot unearthed

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Saturday, Oct 28, 2006
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Al-Badr terrorist plot unearthed

K.V. Subramanya and R. Krishna Kumar

Two Pakistani militants held in Mysore

— PHOTO: M.A. SRIRAM

BREAKTHROUGH: Pakistani militant Fahad being led away by the Mysore police after he was arrested in the early hours of Friday.

K.V. Subramanya and

R. Krishna Kumar

BANGALORE/MYSORE: With the arrest of Pakistani nationals Fahad (24) and Mohammad Ali Husain (24) in Mysore early on Friday, the contours of a daring plan by the Al-Badr terrorist group to attack the Vikasa Soudha in Bangalore and the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) in Mysore have become clear, B.S. Sial, Director-General and Inspector-General of Police has said.

The Al-Badr was planning to send a team from Kashmir shortly to carry out the attacks, Mr. Sial said in Bangalore on Friday.

Fahad of North Nizamabad in Karachi had been instructed by the outfit to arrange for safe hideouts and explosives.

Meanwhile, a statement by Suvarna, landlady of the house at Rajivnagar where the two accused lived, contested the encounter theory put out by the police.

She said her tenants were picked up by plainclothes men much earlier.

"I have not seen my tenants ever since they were taken away by the police 20 days ago," she told presspersons in Mysore.

Husain of Manshera in Pakistan and Fahad had surveyed the Vikasa Soudha and sent details of the building by e-mail to their headquarters in Pakistan.

A detailed map of the Vikasa Soudha was found in a laptop seized from them, according to Mysore Police Commissioner Praveen Sood. Over 2500 telephone numbers were stored in the satellite phone seized from them.

The accused were in Mysore to survey the CIIL, a premier institute that attracts many foreign scholars.

Fahad was entrusted with creating an "Indian identity" for Al-Badr recruits who would be sent to India through the Nepal border. In the past eight months Fahad received around Rs. 12 lakh through banking channels and a part of the amount was given to Al-Badr cadres.

Police said Fahad had a master's degree in analytical chemistry from Karachi University. He came to India from Karachi on a Pakistani passport with an Indian visa issued on November 30, 2005 and valid for 45 days. It allowed him to visit Bangalore and Kolkata but he overstayed his time.

Fahad obtained a driving licence from the Mysore RTO on October 5, 2006 and a birth certificate from the Mysore City Corporation in July.

Husain, on the other hand, had sneaked into India through the Lepa valley in 2002 and was the district commander of the Al-Badr in Kashmir.

His job was to create a base for the outfit in south India, Mr. Sial said.

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