NIA picks up mastermind in January’s Bodh Gaya blast

Thirty-eight-year-old Mohammed Jahidul Islam, aka Kausar, picked up from Turup Lane in Ramanagaram in the city outskirts on August 5, is a pricey catch for the National Investigation Agency (NIA).

Kausar, also known by names like Munna, Mizan and Boma Miyan, is a wanted terrorist in the Burdwan blast case, besides being a mastermind in the low-intensity blast at Bodh Gaya earlier this year when the Dalai Lama was camping in the town.

Following inquiries, Kausar’s arrest was regularised on August 7.

He was produced before the NIA’s special court in Bengaluru, which granted the officials five-day transit remand.

Kausar is being taken to Patna, where he will be produced before the Special NIA court and taken into custody for interrogation, an NIA release stated.

The agency would interrogate him on the Burdwan blast case, where he is accused number 24 and shown on the charge sheet as an absconding accused.

Searches at Kausar’s house in Turup Lane yielded some electronic devices and traces of explosives, which the NIA officials have recovered.

An NIA official said Kausar is a senior leader of the Jamat-ul-Mujahidin Bangladesh (JMB) in India, besides being an illegal immigrant from Bangladesh.

While probing the Bodh Gaya case, the NIA arrested two accused Abdul Karim alias Chhota (19), residing in Elizabad in Murshidabad, and Mustafizur Rehman alias Shaheen alias Tuhin (37), living in Birbhum in West Bengal, on August 3.

The NIA registered a case under IPC Sections 120, 121-A, 122, 123 & 153(A); Sec 16, 18 and 20 of UA (P) Act, 1967; Sec 14, 17 and 19 of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Delivery System, UA (P)Act, 2005; and Section 4 and 5 of the Explosive Substance Act to investigate the recovery and explosion of IEDs near
Kalchakra Maidan, Bodh Gaya, in Bihar.

Chhota and Tuhin were arrested from a Bengali-speaking labour camp in Malappuram district, Kerala. NIA officials revealed that the accused hid there after planting IEDs at Bodh Gaya in January. The team had recovered incriminating materials, including a circuit design of an IED, from their hideout in
Malappuram during the searches.

NIA officials also found that they was in touch with Kausar while he was in Ramanagaram. After the two arrests from Malappuram, the NIA established the identities of 10 more accused persons involved in the conspiracy to cause explosions in Bodh Gaya.

The two were produced before a NIA special court in Kochi on August 4 that granted a four-day transit warrant, enabling the agency to get their custody at Patna’s NIA court.

On April 3, the NIA arrested three accused in the Bodh Gaya case — Ahmad Ali alias Kalu, Mohammad Paigambar and Noor Alam.

Investigations revealed that JMB terrorists operating under Kausar and Rehman, charge-sheeted as absconders in the Burdwan blast case, hatched a plan to set-off bombs in Bihar’s Bodh
Gaya during the Dalai Lama’s visit.

Probes revealed that Karim was present at the hideout in Jehanabad at the time of the incident. He was involved in the planning, execution and preparation of IEDs. Rehman, accused no 30 in the case, arranged and assembled all explosives on Kausar’s directions.

NIA officials also said Rehman was part of the conspiracy. He collected material for IEDs and conducted recee of the blast venue — Kalchakra Maidan in Bodh Gaya.