Days after an alleged Pakistani national was arrested for living in India on fake identity and planning a terror strike, a Delhi court has granted permission to the police to conduct a polygraph test of the accused.
The Delhi Police Special Cell had arrested Mohammed Ashraf, who allegedly had been living in India for 15 years as Ahmed Ali Noori, from East Delhi’s Laxmi Nagar on October 11.
Advocate Deepak Tyagi, who is representing Ashraf, said the police had sought permission for a polygraph test and the court granted the same on Thursday. “In their application, the police said Mohammed Ashraf was not cooperating in the investigation and they needed to conduct the test,” he said.
‘Important case’
Police sources said the reason cited for the polygraph test was to extract more information and take the investigation further “as it’s an important case”. The polygraph test, also known as lie detector test, has no evidentiary value in court.
The police said they had recovered an AK-47 rifle with two magazines, 60 sophisticated pistols with 50 rounds and a hand grenade at Ashraf’s instance from near the Yamuna, buried under the soil.
He was a resident of Pakistan’s Punjab who and had come to India nearly 15 years ago; he was living with fake documents which had a Bihar address, said the police.
Ashraf, according to the police, stayed at a house in Laxmi Nagar’s Aram Park for less than a year about a decade ago. He took documents from the then landlord to get his Aadhaar card made.
The accused was sent to 14-day police custody. During interrogation and investigation, the police said, it was found that Ashraf was involved in the 2011 High Court blasts. In 2007, he had married a woman and left her after three to four months.
“The reason to marry was to acquire goodwill in society and in-turn identity documents,” an investigator said.
