Ajay Banerjee & Shaurya Karanbir Gurung, Tribune News Service
New Delhi, June 30. After sustained interrogation of 26/11 attacks plotter Sayed Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Jundal, Indian investigators have turned their gaze towards an Indian youth who often visits India from Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, Abu Jundal is likely to be booked by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the case registered against US-based David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Rana.
Jundal’s voice samples have been obtained and these will now be matched with the phone intercepts recorded during the Mumbai attacks.
Sources have indicated that Indian investigators were looking at some six associates of Abu Jundal, who are still living in Saudi Arabia — All of them are suspected operatives of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT).
One of them is a youth in his late twenties. He has been visiting India around the same time when one blast or another had occurred in the past three-four years. He has so far escaped the scanner as he does a normal job in the kingdom and ‘visits’ his family and flies back. He is suspected to be one of those who had come in touch with Jundal in Saudi Arabia. His visits to India do not seem coincidental as his name and description have been cropping up in investigations.
India has asked for further cooperation from Saudi Arabia in nabbing these suspects, who have been treating the gulf countries as a hideout. The arrest of Jundal and the wide publicity it got, has possibly alerted his associates. Indications have come that a youth Fayyaz Kagzi, may also be in Saudi Arabia and has been detained for deportation to India.
Indian authorities are also suspecting a youth Mohd Fasih, who has been missing from his home in the kingdom. His family in India has filed a petition in court wanting to know his whereabouts. His antecedents and also his activities and contacts in India are being probed. Men like Kagzi, Fasih and Jundal are mere blocks of the terror pyramid that the Lashkar-e-Toiba has built to target India, said an official.
Indian investigators will also be looking at Fayyaz Kagzi, who is wanted in the Pune German Bakery blast and Aurangabad arms haul cases. On June 8, the NIA registered an FIR against Jundal and Kagzi for being part of a terror organisation.
Both Jundal and Kagzi have been charged under Sections 18 and 20 — for being a part of a terror organisation — under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). The registration of the FIR is seen as hint that Kagzi was firmly detained and is expected to be handed over to India. Kagzi, like Jundal, hails from Beed district, Maharashtra, and is a key operative of the Indian Mujahideen (IM).
Pakistan seeks more details
Islamabad: Pakistan’s Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik has sought a copy of the statement given by 26/11 key handler Abu Jundal even as he questioned authenticity of the Pakistani passport held by the LeT terrorist. “Pakistan expects to receive a copy of the statement. I expect to have original passport,” Malik wrote in a message posted on Twitter late last night. Indian authorities have said that Ansari alias Abu Jundal – who is an Indian citizen – had travelled to Saudi Arabia on a Pakistani passport. (PTI)
