Police take terror-accused to Vagamon

The
police on Wednesday held on-the-spot evidence collection at the
high-altitude resort of Vagamon in Idukki district by taking Shaduli of
Eerattupetta and Muhammad Ansar of Aluva, the two persons who allegedly
organised the training camp for outlawed Islamist outfit SIMI there in
December 2007.

According to top police officials of Gujarat
and Karnataka, this camp had served as the training session for the
blasts in various Indian cities last year. Shaduli was the master-brain
behind the camp at Vagamon. He himself was the person who identified
the high-altitude resort as the most appropriate place for such a camp.

Shaduli and Ansar were brought to Kerala for evidence-gathering
in Vagamon from the prison in Gulbarga, Karnataka last week. The police
had earlier taken Mil Parvez, Hafiz Hussein of Karnataka and Shaduli’s
brother Shibili to Vagamon for evidence-collection. A police team
headed by DySP KR Kannan and Sub-Inspector IJ Thomas had taken the
Shaduli and Ansar, who were lodged at the district prison in Kottayam,
to Vagamon. The police were also examining the reports that Sufiya,
wife of PDP supremo Abdul Nasser Madani, had visited the Vagamon camp.

The
Judicial First Class Magistrate Court II, Kanjirappally had on Saturday
last remanded Shaduli and Ansar in custody for 14 days. The special
probe team had requested the court to leave them in their custody for
taking them to Vagamon for evidence-collection.

According to
the police, Shaduli and Muhammad Ansar had been involved in the blasts
in Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi. It was in this context that
allegations had come up that Sufiya had made a trip to Vagamon when the
terror training camp was on there. A special police team would
investigate the case relating to the alleged visit by Sufiya to the
training camp at Vagamon.

The special team of the Kerala
Police had been reportedly entrusted with the task of probing the
alleged visit by the PDP chief’s wife to Vagamon as this had kicked off
a controversy in Kerala. A court-ordered probe into the alleged role of
Sufiya in the case of burning of a Tamil Nadu State Transport bus at
Kalamassery, off Kochi was already on.

According to the Director
General of Police, Gujarat, the SIMI camp at Vagamon, which followed a
meeting of the outfit’s operatives at Panayikkulam, Aluva on August 15,
2007, was where the detailed practical plans of last year’s Indian
Mujahiddeen terror attacks in different Indian cities were designed.

Responses