Narendra Modi tops Indian Mujahideen hit-list: Yasin Bhatkal to cops

Zee Media Bureau/Sushmita Dutta

New Delhi/Patna: Indian Mujahideen co-founder and mastermind of several blasts, Yasin Bhatkal during interrogation told Bihar police that Bharatiya Janata Party`s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi not only tops the hit-list of this terror organisation but is also the main target of IM. "Narendra Modi is first on the list...second is Narendra Modi...all the way upto No 10, it is only Modi," Bhatkal allegedly said, according to senior policemen who interrogated him. Yasin Bhatkal is believed to have played an active part in almost all terror attacks by the IM including the Hyderabad, Bangalore and Pune blasts. In fact, he was caught on the CCTV camera of the German Bakery in Pune when he had planted the bomb there. Amidst the General Elections 2014, Indian security forces are preparing for one of their most challenging assignments in decades, protecting BJP`s PM aspirant and Chief Minister of Gujarat Narendra Modi in a country with a grim history of political assassinations. Last month, Imtiaz Ansari, one of the arrested suspects in the Patna blasts had also revealed that the blasts were a terror strike orchestrated by the Indian Mujahideen (IM) to avenge the Muzaffarnagar riots. He had claimed that the conspiracy was hatched by Tehseen Akhtar, who is the right hand man of arrested IM mastermind Yasin Bhatkal. The Patna blasts had rocked the capital city on October 27, few minutes prior to the `Hunkar rally` of BJP`s PM candidate Narendra Modi, whereas the second explosion took place at a movie theatre when the BJP leader had arrived in the state capital to address the rally in Gandhi Maidan. Communal animosity has led to several high-profile assassinations in India, beginning months after independence when a Hindu fanatic gunned down Mahatma Gandhi, the leader of a non-violent struggle to throw off British rule. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who was not related to Mahatma Gandhi, was killed by Sikh bodyguards in 1984 and her son, former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, was killed by an ethnic Tamil suicide bomber in 1991. However, after this incident an elite security team has been provided to Modi but the challenge to protect and safeguard this most popular leader of India will surely remain a big challenge for the Indian government and security agencies.