Yasin Bhatkal triggers terror alert in Telangana jail

The Telangana Police on Saturday  beefed up  security at the Charlapally jail  here following reports that jailed terrorist Yasin Bhatkal (alias Mohammed Ahmed Siddibappa), the co-founder of Indian Mujahedeen, planned to escape with support of Islamic State terrorists.

The National Intelligence Agency (NIA) has alerted the police about his escape agenda after they kept a tab on his telephonic talks with his family members with whom he spoke constantly. “Bhatkal spoke to his wife Zahida and mother twice in a week,” said Prisons DIG Vinay Kumar Singh. The phone call by Bhatkal to his wife Zahida, was allegedly made from an official land phone in the high security Cherlapally Jail, and was intercepted by security agencies about a month ago.

The call hints at him getting help from the Islamic State, which controls large swathes of territory in both Syria and Iraq.  According to newspaper reports Bhatkal is heard telling his wife Zahida who lives in Delhi, that people from Damascus are helping, and he will be free very soon.

Bhatkal, 32, arrested in 2013 in connection with the Mumbai serial blasts in 2011, has permission granted by a Metropolitan court to use the official phone inside the Hyderabad prison where he is interned since 2014.

e can talk twice a week to family members like any other prisoners. The names and phone numbers of his relatives are registered. All phone conversations are recorded by jail authorities.

However, the prison authorities say that Bhatkal could be misleading the police and the intelligence about his plans. “Yasin could be deliberately misleading the police as he knows that the phone is being recorded,” said V K Singh.

Singh also denied that Yasin had access to a mobile phone inside the jail.
Bhatkal is lodged in a high special security cell in the Manjira block where he is always guarded by a security guard on a 24x7 basis.

Yasin was arrested from Bihar in 2013 by the NIA. He was the key conspirator of three powerful blasts which ripped through crowded areas in Mumbai — Zaveri Bazar, Opera House and Kabutar Khana — on July 13, 2011, killing at least 21 people and injuring 141.
DH News Service