Ahmedabad, Aug 29: In a major breakthrough, city police today arrested five persons hailing from sensitive Dariapur and Shahpur areas in connection with Akshardham temple attack and said their interrogations revealed that terrorist outfits Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) had masterminded the strike.
City Police Commissioner K R Kaushik said it was sometime during the post-Godhra riots last year that the conspiracy to attack the Akshardham temple was hatched in Riyadh, capital of Saudi Arabia, and the five
accused had provided logistic support to the two terrorists, who were killed by the NSG commandos.
Acting on a specific information, police arrested Salim Sheikh, Mufti Abdul Kayoom Mansuri, Maulvi Abdul Miyan Sayyed -- all residents of Dariapur area and Altaf Malek and Suleman Aadam Ajmeri, staying in the Shahpur area, he said.
Police acted after getting information that some Muslim youths of the city, who were working in various cities of Saudi Arabia and were closely associated with Pakistan`s ISI and JeM and LeT, had come to Ahmedabad recently.
Salim Sheikh, who was picked up late last night, following specific information of his involvement, revealed during interrogation that he and a Riyadh-based person from Ahmedabad Rashid Ajmeri were roped in this conspiracy by the JeM and LeT men and Ajmeri had directed his brother Aadam in the city to
aid them, Kaushik said.
Crime branch immediately nabbed Aadam from his residence and his preliminary interrogation revealed that he was called to Hyderabad, a week before the attack and briefed about the conspiracy by Abutalha and another suspected terrorist Ayub Khan. They also told him that two terrorists would be coming for the operation from Pakistan.
The Police Commissioner said Aadam contacted Mufti Abdul Kayoom and Maulana Abdullah, who were then running a relief camp in Bawahir Hall for the riot victims in Dariapur.
He said the two terrorists, identified as Hafiz Yaseer from Lahore and Mohammed Farooq from Rawalpindi, were received at the city railway station by Aadam, a week before the attack.
To a question, he said, "The terrorists were also shown the secretariat building as well the state assembly. But considering huge crowd and less resistance at Akshardham, they decided to target it.
"They also visited the temple twice and carried out a recce. On the day of attack, they were four of them including Aadam and Ayub Khan, who went ahead of the terrorists, in an autorickshaw", the commissioner added.
However, it is still not known from where the Pakistan-based terrorists boarded the train.
Ayub Khan and Aadam had positioned themselves near the children`s park in the sanctum sanctorum before the terrorists arrived in an Ambassador car.
Earlier, few hours before leaving for the attack, Mufti Abdul Kayoom had administered the "shahadat namaaz" (namaaz for martyrdom) to the two terrorists at a mosque in Kalupur, the Police Commissioner added.
The terrorists stormed the temple through gate number 3 at 4:30 pm and seeing that the attack had been executed, Aadam and Ayub Khan managed to flee from the spot amidst tremendous chaos. Aadam dropped Ayub to railway station in Kalupur area, from where he rented an Ambassador car and fled towards Vadodara.
The news that the temple had been "successfully" attacked was conveyed to Salim Sheikh, Abutalha, Rasid Ajmeri and Abusufiyan by the two Muslim clerics, Kaushik said.
Thirty-two people, including three security personnel, were killed in the attack on September 24 last year.
Bureau Report
