Terror's new faces

The Gujarat police announced on August 16 the identification and arrest of 10 activists of the Students Islamic Movement of India in connection with the serial blasts in Ahmedabad on July 26. Nine of the arrests were made in Ahmedabad and Vadodara in Gujarat and the tenth arrest, of Mufti Abu Bashir, the leader, was made with the co-operation of the Uttar Pradesh police in Azamgarh.

According to details given by a team of senior Gujarat police officers at a special press conference, the arrested persons formed the core of a larger group of SIMI activists who had planned and carried out the blasts in Ahmedabad, under the name of Indian Mujahideen. They also said while they have definitively established the involvement of these persons and their associates not yet arrested in the Gujarat blasts, they have some indications that some of these persons might have also been involved in the serial blasts of May in Jaipur and in the blasts of November 2007 in UP. Further investigation is in progress.

We said it first: Exclusive! Breakthrough in Ahmedabad blasts case

All the persons arrested so far and the suspects not yet arrested are Indians. All the arrested persons are in their 20s. A collation of available details is given below:

Abdul Rashid, also known as Mufti Abu Bashir Ilahi, aged 26. Believed by the police to be the mastermind behind the serial blasts in Ahmedabad on July 26, and the planned but failed blasts in Surat the next day. Studied Arabic in the Deoband seminary in Uttar Pradesh. Comes from a lower middle class family in Azamgarh (village Beenapara) in Uttar Pradesh. Father, a paralytic, is unemployed and mother is a housewife. The family is dependent on his earnings as a teacher of Arabic in a madrasa in Hyderabad called the Jamait Ul Sheikh Al Maududi located at Pahadisharif in Hyderabad. The madrasa had been started by another native of Azamgarh called Maulana Abdul Aleem Islahi.

Abu Bashir has four brothers and one sister. Two of his brothers are working in Delhi and Mumbai. The other siblings are studying in a madrasa in Azamgarh. Abu Bashir worked for two years in the Hyderabad madrasa, till January 2007. According to the Hyderabad police, he left the madrasa for Azamgarh that month. According to his father, he returned to his village only about a month ago saying the madrasa was closed for vacations. For nearly 18 months, he was neither in the madrasa nor his village. Some of this period between March and July 2008, he had spent in Ahmedabad.

According to the Gujarat police, he was present in Ahmedabad on the day of the blasts. It is not yet known where he was from January 2007 to March 2008, when he allegedly  took over as the head of the SIMI network after the arrest of Safdar Nagori, the general secretary of SIMI, and his brother Karimuddin by the Indore police. Bashir came into contact with SIMI when he was teaching in the Hyderabad madrasa and became its active member.

Maulana Abdul Aleem Islahi is an activist and known sympathiser of SIMI. His son Mohtasin Billa was also in SIMI.
While examining the cell phone records of Ahmedabad over a few months before the blasts, the Gujarat police's crime branch identified five numbers which had only received incoming calls from public call offices located mostly at a place called Juhapura in Ahmedabad. Investigations indicated that during his stay in Ahmedabad Abu Bashir had purchased five SIM cards in the names of local residents. Zahid Sheikh was making the calls to Abu Bashir at these numbers. These numbers went silent after the blasts.

How the Ahmedabad blasts case was solved

Abu Bashir and Abdul Subban Quereshi were staying in a rented house at a place called Vatva in Ahmedabad. This house had been hired with the assistance of Zahid Shaikh and Sajid Mansuri.

Imran Ibrahim Sheikh, aged 23. Did a course in human rights and journalism in MS University, Vadodara, and arrested

Imran Ibrahim Sheikh. Bombs placed in Surat were assembled in his home.

The improvised explosive devices used in Ahmedabad and Surat were assembled at three different places -- in the house at Vatva in Ahmedabad in which Abu Bashir was staying, in Imran Sheikh's house in Vadodara, and in another house in  Kalpur in Ahmedabad. It is not known who was staying in the Kalpur house.

Zahid Sheikh, a resident of Juhapura in Ahmedabad. Imran Sheikh's interrogation led to him. He allegedly confessed that he had planted bombs on cycles in Ahmedabad. He named at least three people who were involved in the purchase of the bicycles and delivery of the IEDs.

Zahid Sheikh was under surveillance by the Ahmedabad police even before the blasts. He had also attended the training camps in Kerala and Gujarat under an assumed name. He had provided local logistics support for a team of nine -- five from Madhya Pradesh, two from Maharashtra and two from Karnataka -- which had come to Ahmedabad. The team held meetings in the Bapunagar area of Ahmedabad in April, another one in a different city in May and the final one on July 20 at Zahid's residence.

Zahid's confession led to the arrest of Yunus Mansuri, Shanshuddin Sheikh, Arif Kadri, Gyasuddin from Ahmedabad and Imran, Usman Agarbattiwala, Iqbal Sheikh and Sajid Mansuri from Vadodara.

Indian Mujahideen is SIMI V2.0

Usman Agarbattiwala, aged 24. A BCom graduate from MS University, Vadodara, he attended training camps in Kerala and Pavagadh near Vadodara under an assumed name. His laptop was allegedly used for programming the timer chips for the IEDs planted in Surat, which failed to explode.

Sajid Mansuri. Chief coordinator of Ahmedabad blasts.

Abdul Subban Qureshi. An explosives expert who holds a diploma in electronic engineering, he allegedly procured ammonium nitrate and timers for the Ahmedabad operation and had them stored in a safe house in Bharuch, and had attended SIMI's meetings to plan the serial blasts. The arrested suspects have claimed that it was Abdul Subban Qureshi who drafted the three e-mails claiming responsibility for the blasts of November 2007 in UP, May in Jaipur and July in Ahmedabad on behalf of  Indian Mujahideen. He forwarded the drafts to Mufti Bashir. Qureshi is absconding.

Adnan, also known as Hafiz Mullah is a young computer engineer and a prominent SIMI organiser for South India. He was arrested along with some other SIMI leaders in Indore in March 2008. He had named Abu Bashir as being responsible for SIMI activities in Gujarat.

Kamaruddin Nagori, brother of Safdar Nagori, was in charge of organising training camps. He was assisted by Adnan, Shibly Peedical Abdul and his brother Shaduli. The first camp was in Karnataka between April and September 2007, the second in Kerala in October-November 2007, the third in Madhya Pradesh in December 2007, and the fourth in Gujarat in January 2008.

ISI's Indianisation of jihad

The plans for the series of blasts in different cities were drawn up during the  training camp in the jungles of Waghamon near Aluva (previously Alwaye) in Kerala where 40 recruits from different states were put through a commando course. This camp was addressed by both Safdar and his brother. This camp was followed by the blasts in three cities of UP in November 2007.

Kayamuddin Kapadia is chief of SIMI operations in Gujarat.

Others arrested by the Gujarat police: Yunus Mansuri, Shamsuddin Sheikh, Arif Kadri, Gyasuddin and Iqbal Sheikh. Their particulars are not available.

Photographs Courtesy: Intelligence Sources