The Hindu : Not much headway in Tughlakabad encounter probe

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Dec 16, 2002

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Not much headway in Tughlakabad encounter probe

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI DEC. 15. Even as the two suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists believed to belong to Pakistan, remained unidentified and the third who managed to escape remained untraced, the Delhi police have not been able to make much headway in the investigations related to Saturday's encounter. The two were killed in a heavy exchange of fire near Tughlakabad Fort when they were coming from Faridabad in Haryana early in the morning.

Police officials said the intelligence agencies were trying to gather more information on the slain terrorists even as a hunt was on for the third. As of now, the bodies of the slain terrorists have been preserved for 72 hours. The police may postpone their post-mortem for a few days if they are not identified till then.

A search of their bodies did lead to the recovery of identity cards, purportedly issued by the Jammu and Kashmir Government. However, the police said it was fake and such kind of identity cards are normally carried by terrorists to mislead the police.

The number of the white Maruti Zen car, in which the terrorists were travelling, is yet to be ascertained. The number plate (DL-7C-5921) found on the car actually belonged to a black Cielo car owned by a resident of Paschim Vihar in West Delhi. The vehicle has been sent to Central Forensic Science Laboratory for resuscitation of the engine and the chassis number of the car, which was found scraped.

According to police sources, the extent of the involvement of the third person who managed to escape under the cover of fog and darkness is not yet clear. While initially, the police said it seemed that he was local contact assigned the job of taking the terrorists to their target, they have not ruled out the possibility of his involvement in core operations.

The police are yet to ascertain if Faridabad was actually the place where the terrorists had set up their base on account of its proximity to the Capital and relative lack of surveillance. There is a possibility of Faridabad being only a transit point in the entire conspiracy.

So far the police are of the opinion that the terrorists might have wanted to attack Kalkaji temple which was not very far from the spot where they were killed. However, the possibility of them attacking the offices of Border Security Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police, Indian Air Force and the Central Reserve police Force was also not ruled out. But since no maps, photographs and mobile phones were recovered, there is no telling what their actual intentions were.

The terrorists were intercepted by Special Cell teams on Karni Singh shooting Range T-point near Tughlakabad Fort when they were coming in a white Zen car from Faridabad.

Even as investigations of the encounter has been handed over to the South Delhi police, STD phone-bills indicating that the terrorists made calls to Muridke in Pakistan which is also said to be the head-quarters of LeT have been found.

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