Khagragarh blast accused arrested

Kolkata: In a major breakthrough, the Special Task Force (STF) of Kolkata Police arrested Jamat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) activist Burhan Sheikh from Munchipara in Central Kolkata on Thursday evening. He was one of the prime accused in Khagragarh blast incident and carried a bounty of Rs 3 lakh.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) is probing the Khagragarh blast that took place on October 2 in 2014.

Acting on a tip off, officers of the Kolkata Police's STF conducted a raid in a hideout near Sealdah Station on B B Ganguly Street at Munchipara and arrested the accused.

Sources said that the police had been receiving information of Burhan's movement in and around the city. They had also got details that he would be taking shelter in a congested area in the heart of the city with an intention to meet some of the sympathisers of the banned outfit.

The 30-year-old accused, Burhan, is originally a resident of Shimulia near Mangalkot in Burdwan and his task was to motivate more youth to get involved with the JMB. He was also in-charge of running centres to train JMB activities. Besides training them, he had also played a major role in collecting money for the outfit and he was even well-trained in making Improvised Explosive Device (IED).

The NIA had come to know about him soon after initiating the probe and after arresting some of the JMB activists. His name had also appeared in the charge-sheet that the NIA had submitted before the Bankshall Court in connection with the blast. The NIA had given names of 30 accused in the charge-sheet and at present seven of them are still at large.

It was on July 8, Nasirullah, alias Sohail Mahfuj, who was the second-in-command of JMB was arrested in Bangladesh.

It may be mentioned that JMB commander Sajid Sheikh was arrested on November 9 in 2014 by the Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate and Rajeev Kumar was the then Commissioner of Bidhannagar Police.

Kumar is now the Commissioner of Kolkata Police when its STF arrested another key activist of JMB. Sajid was later handed over to the NIA. Similarly, Burhan will also be handed over to the central investigating agency.