Goa blast: Police probe foreign links of Sanatan Sanstha

"Some foreigners often visited the ashram at Ramnathi. I have checked with the police. They were not even submitting their C forms to police station," state Home Minister Ram Naik said.

Foreigners on tourist visas are required to submit the C forms. "We have found that many foreigners used to visit the place. We need to know what they were doing here," he said, adding police had tried to get the details of those people but the ashram has no record of them.

Sanatan ashram at Ramnathi has been under the scanner after the blast. Two persons, owing allegiance to the Sanstha, linked to 2008 Malegaon blast accused Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, were killed in the blast on Friday night. The police has confirmed that IED was used in the blast.

The Sanstha has denied the allegations against it terming them as "baseless".

Though police has confirmed the arrest of one person in the case, Naik said formal arrests are yet to be made although some people have been detained.

He said that in the wake of blasts, the foreign links of the ashram have attained importance. "Even yesterday, there were three French nationals staying in the ashram".

To a question, Naik said there were no intelligence inputs about the blast. "At least, I was not informed about any inputs". Naik refused to comment on whether the CID had been on the lookout of the main accused in the blast, Malgonda Patil.

The organisation had on October 11 claimed that police were on the look out for Patil.

About reports that Jyoti Dhavalikar, the wife of state transport minister Ramkrishna Dhavalikar, was an employee of Sanatan Sanstha, Naik said police would examine her case too.

Malgonda Patil, who was one of the two persons injured, later died at Goa Medical college, while another member of the right wing outfit, who was seriously injured in the blast, is still in a critical state.

Nishad Bakhle, the owner of the scooter in which the explosive was kept, was also traced to the Sanstha office at Ramnathi, which was raided after the blast.