NIA to probe MP train blast, Lucknow encounter: HM
9 March 2017 11:00 PM IST
The NIA will probe suspected terror cases, including the Lucknow encounter in which an alleged terrorist linked to a train blast was killed, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Thursday.
While the Uttar Pradesh police shot dead suspected terrorist Mohammad Saifullah on Wednesday, six suspects have been arrested by cops in Madhya Pradesh and UP on terror charges, Singh said in a statement in the Lok Sabha.
Members thumped desks when the Minister lauded Saifullah's father Mohammad Sartaj for his refusal to accept his son's body saying "if he could not be loyal to the country, how can he be ours".
"The government is proud of him and I am sure Parliament too is," he said. Saifullah was suspected to be linked with the blast in the Bhopal-Ujjain train in Madhya Pradesh on Tuesday.
Giving details of various cases registered in the two states following the blast which injured 10 persons, he said the state police arrested three suspects in Hoshangabad in Madhya Pradesh, following which the UP cops acted in various parts of the state following information provided by the accused and nabbed three persons.
"The above sequence of events presents an excellent example of coordination amongst state police and central agencies. Due to the prompt action taken by the police of both the state, a possible threat to national security was successfuly averted.
"Further investigations will be handed over to the NIA," he said.
The Home Minister also informed the House that eight pistols, 630 live cartridges, Rs 1.5 lakh, three mobiles phone, four sim cards, two wireless sets and some foreign currency were recovered from the place where Saifullah lived.
Highlighting the issue of the encounter in which an alleged ISIS operator was killed, BJD's Baijayant Panda said the government should specifically focus on this "transnational" threat.
The BJD MP said the NIA had arrested 68 people allegedly related to ISIS and 70 per cent of them belonged to the middle and upper classes.
Not yet known which terror outfit Saifullah belonged to: Ahir
Union Minister Hansraj Ahir on Thursday said it was too early to know which terrorist outfit slain terror suspect Saifullah belonged to, amid suspicion that he was influenced by an ISIS module.
Saifullah, who is suspected to be linked with the blast in the Bhopal-Ujjain train, was killed in an encounter in Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday. "We have asked for the report. We have not received the final report and full information has not yet come. What can be said from the documents and other material is that he was a terrorist. "We will get to know who he was linked with after we get the final report," Ahir, who is MoS for Home Affairs, told reporters outside Parliament. Home Minister Rajnath Singh said in Lok Sabha that NIA will carry out further investigations into the matter.
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