A suspect identified as Ziaur Rehman, known by his alias Waqas, is escorted by police following his arrest in Jodhpur.
Police yesterday said they had arrested four suspects of the home-grown militant group Indian Mujahideen, blamed for a string of deadly attacks across the country in recent years.
The arrests come as India is on high security alert ahead of next month’s general election with police saying they had prevented a new terrorist strike.
One of the suspects is Ziaur Rehman, popularly known by his alias Waqas, who was arrested along with three of his aides in Rajasthan state on Saturday, Special Police Commissioner S N Srivastava said at a news conference in New Delhi.
“Waqas is a Pakistani national and he was planning to carry out a terror attack with the help of his associates. But a spectacular terrorist strike has been averted with his arrest,” Srivastava said.
Waqas, 24, is accused of conducting a series of bombings across the country, including the 2011 blasts in Mumbai that killed at least 21 people.
During searches of the hideouts of the arrested men, police recovered detonators, electronic circuits, timers and a large quantity of explosives.
Police were able to track Waqas’ movements with the help of clues provided by his aide and Indian Mujahideen co-founder Yasin Bhatkal, who was arrested last August.
Bhatkal, lodged in Delhi’s high-security Tihar jail, is on trial after being charged with various offences including that of waging war against India.
The group is also suspected of being behind an attack on a rally by Bharatiya Janata Party’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi last October that killed six people and wounded more than 80.
Srivastava declined to comment when asked if Modi was being targeted, saying they needed further investigation.
“Any important event, including elections, could be targeted.”
“Waqas was arrested at the Ajmer Railway Station while coming from Mumbai. He disclosed the hideout of his other associates,” Srivastava said.
The Special Cell of the Delhi police and the Rajasthan police’s Anti-Terrorism Squad arrested the men named by Waqas from Jaipur and Jodhpur. Two of them are engineering students while the third one is a computer expert.
Waqas, an expert in making improvised explosive devices (IEDs), was wanted in connection with several terror attacks including the serial blasts in Mumbai in July 2011, the blast outside Jama Masjid in Delhi, at Varanasi’s Sheetla Ghat, and the Pune German Bakery blasts in 2010.
“A diploma holder in food technology in Pakistan, Waqas came to India in 2010 via Kathmandu. He was received by Tehsin Akhtar alias Monu, an operative commander of IM, to carry out bombing in the country,” said another police officer.
Tehsin was directly in touch with the IM founder-members in Pakistan.
Police said after the arrest of Bhatkal by National Investigating Agency (NIA), Waqas was hiding in various parts of the county.
“He went to Odisha, Bengal, Kerala and Maharashtra,” said the officer.
During interrogation, Waqas told police that the purpose of his visit to Ajmer was to co-ordinate and oversee the preparations of the three terrorists of the Rajasthan module for carrying out a spectacular terror strike.
Federal Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said the arrest of Waqas was a great success as he was a crucial link to the group.
The Indian Mujahideen came to public attention in November 2007 following serial blasts in Uttar Pradesh and is blamed for multiple attacks across the country in which hundreds of people have been killed.
The group is thought to head a network of home-grown militant groups, with some analysts believing it has links with the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohamed militant organisations.
