New Delhi, Feb 29: A major terror attack was foiled in the capital with security agencies arresting two Pakistan-based Lashker-e-Taiba (LeT) operatives who had planned to trigger explosions in crowded localities in the next few days.
Police said the attacks were “very imminent” and both the arrested, whose identity was withheld, were Indian citizens, one of whom was trained in Pakistan in bomb-making and using weapons.
“It is a very important breakthrough,” Home Minister P Chidambaram told reporters today while complimenting security agencies.
Giving only brief details about the case as operation was still continuing to nab more terrorists of the module, Delhi Police Commissioner B K Gupta said the duo were apprehended from Tughlaqabad Extension in south Delhi yesterday following inputs from central intelligence agencies and cooperation of police in Jharkhand and Jammu and Kashmir.
“The arrest of LeT terrorists is a good catch,” Gupta said adding the police has got “valuable evidence” from the memory card seized from the duo.
Investigators have seized a memory card, a matrix (code language used for communication), mobiles and explosives, including sulphuric acide, used for making bombs, P N Aggarwal, Special Commissioner of Police (Special Cell), said.
Sources said five mobile phones were seized from the accused apart from the memory card which had footages of terror training camps and fabrication of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) besides how to fire AK-47s.
However, both Gupta and Aggarwal refused to provide the names of the arrested saying it could affect the ongoing operations to arrest “one or two more terrorists in the module”.
They were produced in chambers before Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Smita Garg who sent them to ten day police custody. Police ensured that the two did not attract any media attention and used the back door to enter and exit the court.
Aggarwal said one of the arrested persons has gone to Pakistan in December 2011 on valid travel documents and returned last month with a mission to carry out a terror strike in Delhi in the very near future.
Asked whether the arrested persons were involved in the recent attack on Israeli embassy car, he said, he did not think so.
Earlier, Chidambaram said, “there was no VVIP on their target.”
“They were planning to detonate a bomb or more than one bomb in crowded localities,” he said, adding more details would come after their detailed questioning. Some more people have been detained in this connection, he said.
Sources said one of the accused was residing in Jharkhand's Hazaribagh, a naxal-dominated area. When asked whether the module had any links with naxals, investigators answered in the negative.
“They were staying in a rented accomodation in Tughlaqabad Extension,” the official said.
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