Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee (CLMC) on Thursday demanded that the government order a judicial probe into the alleged suicide of Abdul Razzaq Masood, an accused in the Sai Baba temple bomb blast case.
The CLMC, which went on a fact-finding mission into the case, released its report on Thursday. According to the CLMC general secretary Lateef Mohammed Khan, the committee felt that Razzaq was murdered and held the police personnel responsible for his death. Mr. Khan, along with committee members S.Q. Masood and Mohammed Ismail Khan, visited Razzaq’s native place in Nizamabad district and interacted with his family. They had also met his neighbours in Humayunnagar where he allegedly hanged himself a few days ago. Razzaq’s father Abdul Sattar told the committee that though his son faced police harassment ever since he returned from Iran in 2005, he would never have opted to end his life. “It’s clearly a murder and police are involved in it,” Mr. Sattar was quoted as saying. In 2005, after arriving at Delhi airport, police took him into custody and foisted a case against him accusing him of being in possession of weapons. Later he was implicated in several cases, including conspiracy and tortured using third degree methods, Mr. Sattar told the committee.
A few months later, the city police arrested him on charges of involvement in Sai Baba temple blast case at Dilsukhnagar. While he was in Cherlapally jail, he was also subjected to Narco Analysis test. Police had also levelled charges against him alleging links with Al Qaeda and Taliban.
When contacted, Humayunnagar Inspector G. Biksham Reddy refuted the charge that Razzaq died due to police harassment. “He ended his life by hanging in his house,” he asserted.
