A shuttered room in the blast-hit building in Burdwan with a Trinamool flag nearby.
India has alerted Bangladesh that the bombs being assembled in a house in West Bengal were meant for terror strikes in that country, reports the Hindustan Times.
A blast in a house in Burdwan on Oct 2 killed two alleged bomb-makers, both of them Bangladeshis.
The ‘Telegraph’ daily says that there was a Trinamool Congress office in that building where the explosions took place and the bombs were being made.
The men and rest of the group were members of a module of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), a banned fundamentalist outfit vehemently opposed to the Hasina regime with close links to the Jamaat-e-Islami, sources said.
Rumi Bibi, whose husband Shamim Shakil Ahmed died in the blast with Swapan Mondal, also told security agencies that in the last three months they had sent four consignments of bombs to Bangladesh through couriers, who she named as ‘Kausar’ and ‘Rasiq’.
The bombs they were making were not meant for attacks in India, she said.
Top Indian intelligence officials passed on the information to Bangladesh’s National Security Intelligence (NSI) and the country’s Director General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) in Dhaka, Hindustan Times reported.
Bengal police detonate home-made bombs on the banks of Damodar before central agencies could examine them. Photo: The Telegraph
Rumi and Ameena Bibi, whose husband Abdul Hakim was injured in the blast, were detained on Thursday but were arrested on Sunday morning. Hakim is being treated at the Burdwan medical college hospital and had refused to cooperate, sources said.
Security agencies, with the help of local police, Sunday conducted raids at least three places in West Bengal to nab JMB cadres. They were also looking for a Murshidabad-based “religious motivator”, sources said.
It is understood that Bangladesh has given to India the names of three JMB members involved in anti-government activities and are said to be based in Bengal.
The police and security agencies also interrogated Mondal’s wife Akina, house-owner Hassan Choudhury and Ameena. Ameena’s father, who lives in Murshidabad, had fought the Gram Panchayat elections on the ruling Trinamool Congress ticket but lost to the CPM candidate.
Twenty-five hand grenades, some 10 ready-for-use improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and large quantities of ammonium nitrate, iron oxide, hydrogen peroxide and other chemicals used in making bombs were recovered from the spot, sources said.
A shuttered room in the blast-hit building in Burdwan with a Trinamool flag nearby. Photo: The Telegraph
The chemicals, Rumi said, were bought from Kolkata. Timer devices, too, were seized. A lathe machine, recovered from the house, was used for making pistols, she said.
The information was shared with Union home secretary Anil Goswami in a meeting with security agencies on Saturday.
There were suggestions that the federal anti-terror body the National Investigative Agency be handed over the case as it had international repercussions.
But, on account of “sensitivities” of the Mamata Banerjee government and the fact that law and order is a state subject, the suggestion was being looked into.
Source: Bd news24
