Police nabs prime accused outside Kolkata airport

Kolkata: The Special Task Force (STF) of the state police has nabbed the prime accused in the Duttapukur blast case on Thursday night outside of the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International (NSCBI) Airport.

The accused, Md. Najrul Islam, had fled to Chennai following the explosion in Duttapukur’s Mochpol area. He was produced at the Barasat Court and has been remanded to police custody for eight days.

According to STF officials, acting on a tip-off the police recently seized about 35 tonnes of illegal crackers from Sajirhat and Amdanga areas and nabbed two persons. While grilling them, Islam’s name cropped up and cops came to know that he was hiding somewhere outside Bengal and trying to remove the stockpile of crackers before police seized them.

Police tracked Islam’s location to Chennai. On Thursday, when he was returning, STF officials nabbed him when he came out from the airport terminal. Earlier, police had seized a huge quantity of illegal crackers from three godowns of Islam and also nabbed his brother.

On Sunday morning, a massive explosion took place inside a house in Mochpool area of Nilganj in Duttapukur. Nine persons were killed in the explosion.

The intensity of the blast was such that the house turned into a pile of debris while at least four other nearby houses were damaged.

The blast led to scattering of body parts of the factory workers which landed on the roof of surrounding houses and even at a distance of more than 100 meters.