A plain-clothes squad early Sunday arrested Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) district leader Praveen in connection with a country bomb attack on the Nedumangad police station during the peak of the Sangh Parivar-sponsored agitation against the entry of women of reproductive age to Sabarimala in early January.
From railway station
A team led by Dy.SP Nedumangad V. Asokan had been on a stake-out at the Central Railway Station, Thampanoor, since Saturday after they received information that the accused would try to board a train to north Kerala.
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Undercover officers arrested Praveen when he entered the station. The police had incriminated the RSS pracharak in the case after surveillance camera footage of him hurling four country bombs in close succession at the station house surfaced as a smoking gun in the media.
The trigger
The incident had occurred on January 2 when Kerala was caught in a vortex of violence a day after two women, Binu Ammini and Kanakadurga, worshipped at Sabarimala temple, upending a ban on women between the age of 10 and 50 years from entering the temple.
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Officers said Praveen, a resident of Nooranad in Kollam district, was politically active in Nedumangad for several years. He was an accused in several cases of causing hurt, including one of attempted murder.
The court had earlier rejected his plea for anticipatory bail.
Petition in High Court
The police had raided the houses of his relatives in Kollam, triggering accusations of harassment and at least one petition in the High Court.
They had issued a wanted person notice against Praveen and arrested at least five persons, including his brother, on the charge of having harboured a fugitive from the law. The police said they would produce Praveen before a magistrate and seek his return to police custody for further questioning.