B’DESH-BASED OUTFIT HELPED PFI MEMBERS ARRANGE EXPLOSIVES
LUCKNOW : Bangladesh-based terror outfit, Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen, helped the two members of Popular Front of India (PFI), who were arrested in Lucknow, in arranging explosives and firearms to carry out terror activities in UP and other parts of the country, said UP STF and ATS officials on Thursday.
The STF had arrested the two PFI members, Asad Badruddin and Feroz Khan, both residents of Kerala, from Lucknow’s Gudamba area on Tuesday. Sixteen high explosive devices with battery detonators, a pistol and live cartridges were recovered from them.
LUCKNOW : Bangladesh-based terror outfit, Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen, helped the two members of Popular Front of India (PFI), who were arrested in Lucknow, in arranging explosives and firearms to carry out terror activities in UP and other parts of the country, said UP STF and ATS officials on Thursday.
The STF had arrested the two PFI members, Asad Badruddin and Feroz Khan, both residents of Kerala, from Lucknow’s Gudamba area on Tuesday.
Sixteen high explosive devices with battery detonators, a pistol and live cartridges were recovered from them.
However, the ATS was further investigating the matter after registering an FIR against them on charges of illegal possession of explosives, firearms and waging war against the country.
During interrogation, the two accused revealed that they had visited Bangladesh a few months ago to seek help from Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen to arrange explosives and firearms to trigger terror blasts in India, said an ATS official.
The two accused were quizzed rigorously on the first day of their seven-day custody remand granted to the ATS by a city court.
A senior STF official said Jammat-ul-Mujahideen was operating in Bangladesh for 23 years. It was declared a terrorist organisation and banned by the government of Bangladesh in February 2005 after attacks on NGOs.
Another police official said identities of five other members of PFI’s hit squad had been ascertained and efforts were on to trace them.