The Bangalore police, in association with their Tamil Nadu counterparts, arrested two men for allegedly providing explosives to carry out the recent Malleswaram blast that left 17 injured. This takes the total number of arrests in the case to six.
Valiyal Hakim and Asghar Ali, also wanted by the Tamil Nadu police in other cases, will be brought to Bangalore for further questioning, Bangalore Police Commissioner Raghavendra Auradkar said. “They have links with Al-Umma. We are interrogating them,” he said.
Sources told The Hindu Hakim is a caterer and Ali a labourer. The police picked them up along with six others for questioning but released the rest.
Prior arrest
Hakim had been arrested by the Coimbatore police during the violence related to the controversy over the Kamal Hassan-starrer Vishwaroopam three months ago and released subsequently. Ali was arrested earlier in a murder case but acquitted in 2007. Days after the Malleswaram blast, the police had arrested Peer Mohideen, Basheer alias Sunnati Basheer and Kichan Buhari all from Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu. The police also got the body warrant for Buhari’s brother-in-law Saddam Hussain, who is lodged in Salem jail.
On April 17, some 17 people, including 11 policemen, were injured in a bomb blast near the Bharatiya Janata Party’s office in Malleswaram. The attackers rigged a motorcycle with ammonium nitrate while the motorcycle itself was used as a projectile to cause destruction. Police said Buhari was found using multiple SIM cards which he used to communicate with the perpetrators, including his contact, Panne Ismail, who had given the money to carry out the task. Ismail is on the run.
Meanwhile, taking cognisance of the police not allowing advocates to meet the blast suspects in custody, the 1st Additional Metropolitan Magistrate Court directed the police to follow Supreme Court guidelines on the matter.
Advocates representing the suspects on Friday filed an application stating that the city police were not allowing them to meet their clients despite court orders. The court asked the advocates to file a contempt of court application. Admitting the application, the court directed the police to follow the Supreme Court guidelines in the wake of the D.K. Bose vs. State of West Bengal, where the apex court had issued a 12-point guideline to the police to allow family members and advocates to meet suspects in custody.
