Suspended DSP Devinder Singh, 4 other accused sent to 15-day NIA custody

Suspended Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Devinder Singh and four other accused were on Thursday sent to 15 days National Investigation Agency (NIA) custody in an espionage case. He was arrested along with Hizbul Mujahideen commander Naveed Babu, his accomplice Rafi Ahmad and a lawyer named Irfan from a car on the highway near Kulgam, Jammu and Kashmir. He was allegedly helping Babu travel to Pakistan in connivance with Irfan. 

The NIA had brought the accused in Delhi on a transit remand from Kulgam and the agency is probing the arrest of Singh for ferrying Hizbul Mujahideen terrorists. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on January 16 had asked the agency to start the investigation into Singh's arrest and take a close look at his alleged involvement with terror groups. A day after Singh's arrest, the Jammu and Kashmir Police conducted raids at the police officer's properties and recovered AK-47, hand grenades and a pistol.

Following his arrest, he was interrogated by a joint team of the Centre and Jammu and Kashmir and was booked under the Unlawful Activity Act. During his interrogation, Singh maintained that he had no link to Hizbul terrorists and that he was taking the terrorists to surrender; but interrogators have dismissed his claims.

According to news agency IANS, a sum of Rs 12 lakh may have been given to Singh to move out the two Hizbul militants to Jammu on their way to Chandigarh and onward to Delhi to carry out attacks on or before the Republic Day. Singh was posted with the anti-hijacking unit at Srinagar Airport and was one of the officials that received the 16-member delegation of foreign ambassadors which visited Kashmir. On January 13, he was suspended from his services.

Intelligence sources told IANS that Singh disclosed that he had put up the terrorists at his Indira Nagar house in Srinagar, right next to the Army's 15 Corps Headquarters, and thereafter accompanied them to Jammu in a car driven by the Hizbul overground worker.

Since the arrest of Singh and the two Hizbul militants, security agencies carried out multiple raids across the Union Territory, especially Srinagar and south Kashmir, and seized a huge cache of arms and ammunition stashed by the officer and the terrorists.