The National Investigation Agency arrested two suspected operatives of the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangaldesh in connection with the 2014 Burdwan blast case from Hooghly district in West Bengal, PTI reported on Tuesday.
An unidentified official of the agency said Kadar Kazi and Sajjad Ali were arrested on Monday night from a building under construction in Borodongol More locality. Battery, wires, electronic circuit, electronic clocks and watches used to make Improvised Explosive Devices were seized from them.
The two people were produced before a special court in Kolkata, which granted the National Investigation Agency 14 days’ custody.
Kazi was named in the chargesheet in connection with the blast case for his direct involvement in the conspiracy to “wage war against government of India and Bangladesh” and was declared a proclaimed offender, IANS quoted an official as saying. Ali was Kazi’s associate and was in touch with operatives of the group.
“Acting on a tip, our officials along with the local police conducted a raid at a place in Hooghly’s Arambagh Monday midnight and arrested these two JMB suspects who were under our radar for the Khagragarh explosion case,” the official said.
The official said that Kazi and Ali were on the run since the explosion that took place in a house in Khagragarh locality of Burdwan town on October 2, 2014.
“The duo had returned to West Bengal a couple of months back,” the official said, adding that they knew how to make Improvised Explosive Devices and were hiding in Arambagh.
When asked if they were planning any terror activity in the state, the official told PTI that it was unclear. “They are being questioned and the agency is testing the documents and materials seized from them,” he said.
Two people, both allegedly citizens of Bangladesh, were killed while manufacturing improvised explosive devices and another was injured on October 2, 2014, in West Bengal’s Burdwan. The National Investigation Agency had framed charges against 30 people in July 2016, 21 months after the blast.
Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen was reportedly started in 1998 and was banned in Bangladesh in February 2005. Its members have been accused of attacking secular bloggers in Bangladesh.
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