BHOPAL (Madhya Pradesh): Anti terrorist squad (ATS) arrested four members of banned Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen of Bangladesh (JMB) from Aishbag police station area of Bhopal early on Sunday morning. All the four members are Bangladeshi nationals.
The operation was carried out by Madhya Pradesh's Anti-Terrorists Squad (ATS) and with the assistance of a team of intelligence unit of the Centre. Based on the inputs, the police rounded up inter-state hard core jihadist module from different locations in Bhopal. Those arrested are outsiders aged 25-30 years and are highly radicalised, sources in the state police said.
They have been arrested from a building located near Fatima Mosque in Bhopal. Sources said the operation was conducted early on Sunday. Apart from Bhopal, a search operation was also conducted in Karond area, located in the outer circle of Bhopal.
. Police sources said the arrests were made from a spot some 200 metres away from a police station in Aishbagh as well as another area in the district.
The suspects were being interrogated at an undisclosed location.
The four arrested JMB members were identified as Fazhar Ali (32), Mohammad Aqueel (24), Jahuruddin Pathan (28) and Faizar Junel. They were arrested from a building near Fatima Mosque in Aishbag. A search operation was also conducted in Karond in the outer circle of Bhopal.
"Investigators have seized jihadi literature and provocative materials from them," a source told IANS.
Mobile phones and laptops were also confiscated from their possession. "They are being interrogated by senior officials at an undisclosed location," sources said.
It has been informed that the arrested persons are pro-Taliban and had dangerous plans, said a senior police official requesting not to be named. Further investigation was underway.
These terrorists were living as tenant in Bhopal and they were making a team of a remote-based sleeper sell to execute their terrorist activities in the future. On the basis of inputs, a search operation was carried out and four Bangladeshi nationals have been arrested," the state police said in an official statement.
JMB was responsible for serial bomb blasts at 300 places in 50 cities in 2005 in Bangladesh. Around 500 small bombs were triggered claiming several lives.
In 2014, a bomb blast in West Bengal had claimed two lives. The outfit had also claimed responsibility of blasts in Bodh Gaya.
The outfit was banned for five years by the Indian government in 2019. Following the ban, the outfit had been operating clandestinely preparing sleeper cells for future terror strike.
“The module which was busted in Bhopal was the part of a sleeper cell and was preparing to execute a terror act,” said the police.
