Andhra Pradesh   

One more cell phone found in Mecca Masjid

Staff Reporter

Found in water tank of mosque; Old City returning to normality

HYDERABAD: One more mobile phone was found on the premises of the Mecca Masjid, where a powerful bomb went off leaving nine persons dead two days ago, here on Sunday.

A team of forensic and bomb experts from the National Security Guard, Delhi, unearthed the cell phone from the mosque's water tank (houz) used by namaazis to perform ablutions before offering prayers. The NSG team also recovered electronic keys of a car, used for locking, from the water tank of the Mecca Masjid.

The experts conducted a thorough search of the blast site and the Masjid premises from Sunday morning and directed the Masjid officials to empty the water tank.

The team also found scraps of metal, pieces of wire, a cell phone, a small piece of metal tube, which may or may not have links with the actual bomb that exploded in the Masjid premises on Friday.

The team also removed the marble platform, which broke under the impact of the bomb, to conduct a thorough search underneath. They collected shreds of marble pieces, before packing them in polythene bags for investigation.

The whole water tank was emptied under the strict vigil of the NSG team. Workers from the Masjid were told to remove whatever foreign objects they could lay their hands on and hand them over to the team of experts.

Old rings made up of various metals, visiting cards, metal objects of various shapes and sizes, cellular phone, electronic lock for cars were carefully collected for investigation by the team of experts.

The old city remained peaceful on Sunday with the police continuing their patrolling all through the day and night. Higher officials continued to camp in the old city and monitored the situation on an hourly basis. No untoward incident was reported anywhere.

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