Pulwama attack: NIA court grants 10-day remand to arrested father-daughter duo

A special court in Jammu has granted 10 days police remand to a father and his daughter arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Tuesday in the Pulwama fidayeen (suicide) attack case, in which 40 CRPF personnel were killed on February 14 last year.

After going through the police diary, special judge NIA, Subash C Gupta, granted a 10-day police remand to the duo.

The central investigation agency said that Tariq Ahmad Shah (50), a tipper driver, and his daughter Insha Jan (23), a college graduate, hailing from Hakripora village of south Kashmir’s Pulwama district provided shelter to the militants involved in planning and executing the deadly attack.

“During the initial interrogation, the accused, Shah, disclosed that his house was used by Adil Ahmed Dar, the suicide bomber who blew himself up by ramming his explosive-laden car into the CRPF convoy,” an NIA spokesperson said.

“The house was also used by Muhammad Umar Farooq, a slain Pakistani militant known for making IEDs, Kamran – another slain Pakistani militant, Sameer Ahmed Dar, a Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) militant from Pulwama and Muhammad Ismail, a Pakistani militant,” he said adding that Shah’s house was also used by these militants for recording a video of Adil Dar, released by Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad outfit soon after the attack.

The NIA has accused Insha of facilitating the militants at their home and providing food and other logistics during their stay on over 15 occasions for two to four days each time, in their house during 2018 and 2019.

Sources said that the arrest of the father-daughter duo was made based on the revelations by 22-year-old Shakir Bashir Magrey, who was held by the anti-terror probe agency on February 28. Magrey, a resident of Hajibal, Kakapora in Pulwama, is an over ground worker (OGW) of the JeM.

Forty CRPF personnel, travelling in a convoy on south Kashmir highway in the Pulwama district, were killed on 14 February, 2019 when Dar rammed a car loaded with explosives into the paramilitary bus at around 3.15 pm at Lethpora. The impact of the blast reduced the bus to a mangled heap.