ISIS or not? Centre miffed with UP cops

Delhi not amused as UP Police say members of busted module were not controlled by Islamic State, only inspired

LUCKNOW/DELHI: Uttar Pradesh police commandos shot dead early on Wednesday a lone gunman who they said was influenced by the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group.

The death ended a 13-hour standoff in a crowded locality on the outskirts of Lucknow, which left many questions unanswered and prompted the Centre to censure Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh police for “jumping to conclusions”.

“Officials in both states should have exercised restraint before airing premature comments. We may hand the probe into the Bhopal-Ujjain passenger train blast and subsequent arrests and the encounter to the National Investigation Agency (NIA),” a senior home ministry official said in New Delhi.

Police of both states had claimed to have found IS links to the 23-year-old slain man, Saifullah Khan, and about seven arrested suspects after a low-intensity train explosion in Madhya Pradesh that wounded 10 people on Tuesday morning. They said these men were from an IS module active in India.

Additional director general of police (law and order) Daljit Chawdhary told reporters on Wednesday evening that there was no evidence the suspects had any direct connection with IS, but could be self-radicalised sympathisers of the terrorist group.

“Their head is Atiq Muzaffar, who was arrested in MP. Two laptops recovered from them suggest they were deeply influenced by IS literature they read on the internet,” he said.

“There is no evidence of any outside funding or any external support. They were self-reliant.”

The operation by the Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terror Squad (ATS) began at 2pm on Tuesday and ended about 3am the next day. Locals said police had come knocking at the door of Saifullah’s rented room four hours before the ATS team arrived.

The wife of Saifullah’s neighbour, a driver, had earlier in day dialled 100 to lodge a domestic violence complaint against her husband. In the course of investigating the abuse case, police questioned Saifullah and took his identity card.

The card and information extracted from suspects arrested in MP for the train blast helped police put two and two together.