New Delhi, Oct 7: A Delhi court today allowed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to quiz Wasim Akram Malik, a Kashmiri native, for 14 days in its custody in connection with the September 7 Delhi High Court blast case.
Special NIA judge H S Sharma remanded Malik, a student of Unani medicine in Bangladesh, for interrogation by the NIA, termed by the investigators as ‘key link' in the conspiracy behind the blast that left 15 people dead and over 70 injured.
During in-camera proceedings, Malik refused to accept legal assistance at the state expense but undertook to cooperate in the investigation, court sources said.
Information about Malik was given by Azhar Ali, an overground worker of Hizbul Mujahideen, who is in Kotbalwal jail in Jammu since 2009, sources said.
Meanwhile, in another turn of events, the special court sent co-accused Abid Hussain to Juvenile Justice Board after his medical reports showed that he was a minor. Hussain had earlier told the court that he was born in 1994 and a major and that his official records did not carry his actual date of birth.
The sources said Hussain also told the judge that he is not sure of the date and month of his birth. Earlier, during the day, the court remanded co-accused Amir Abbas Dev in seven-day NIA custody.
Wasim Ahmed, a student of Unani medicine in Bangaldesh, was being questioned by the NIA in connection with the blast, official sources said.
There was no official word on whether Wasim was arrested near the Indo-Bangla border or the authorities in Dhaka had handed him over.
Of the three people arrested earlier by the NIA in connection with the Delhi blast, one has been let off.
Wasim was also quizzed about the whereabouts of Hizbul Mujahideen operative Junaid Akram, believed to be one of the key conspirators in the Delhi blast, the sources said.
From the leads emerging in the case so far, the investigators suspect that it could be the handiwork of Pakistan-based terror outfit Hizbul Mujahideen and not Harkat-ul-Jehad-Islami (HuJI) as believed earlier.
Information about Wasim was given by Azhar Ali, an overground worker of Hizb, who is in Kotbalwal Jail in Jammu since 2009,the sources said.
An NIA team had questioned Ali, arrested for being allegedly involved in recruiting people from Kishtawar area besides securing SIM cards for the outfit, to know about some of the youths including Akram he had allegedly sent for training to Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir, the sources said.
Though NIA claimed that Akram was in Pakistan, sources in the security agencies believed that he was very much in Jammu and Kashmir.
NIA has arrested Abid Abbas, a high school boy, on charges of having sent an email after the September seven Delhi High Court blast. The probe agency had detained Abbas's brother from Shillong who expressed complete ignorance about the matter. PTI
