AP Cops handed over Kerala Jihadi to Bangalore Police

Abdul Sattar handed over to Bangalore police





Omer Farooq | Hyderabad – Daily Pioneer

Terror
suspect from Kerala, Abdul Sattar, who was arrested in a joint
operation by police of the three southern States, was on Wednesday
handed over to Bangalore police for questioning in the Bangalore bomb
blasts case.

Fifty-seven-year-old resident of Malappuram Abdul
Sattar, who was nabbed by the counter-terrorism cell and central crime
station of Hyderabad along with a team of Kerala Police, was produced
in the Nampally court on Wednesday where the magistrate handed him over
to Bangalore police for 14-day remand.

The police officials in
Hyderabad said that Abdul Sattar has links with the south Indian
brigade of Indian Mujahideen and had close links with Riyaz Bhatkal who
was wanted in connection with Hyderabad twin blasts in August 2007.

Abdul
Sattar had gone absconding from his Hyderabad residence in November
last year after his brother, Abdul Jabbar, was arrested by Kerala
police. The police had then said that Abdul Jabbar had links with
Lashkar-e-Tayyeba and had played a role in recruiting the youth and
sending them across to Pakistan for interrogation. The police said,
“Abdul Jabbar’s name came to light after four Kerala youth were killed
in an encounter in Kashmir in November last year. One of the Kerala
youth killed in the incident, Abdul Raheem Aftab, was Sattar’s
son-in-law.”

Sources said, “Abdul Sattar has admitted his hand
in preparing timer devices for bombs and supplied some of them to Riyaz
Bhatkal. The police are suspecting that these devices were used in the
blasts in Hyderabad, Bangalore and Surat. However, in case of Surat,
the bombs did not explode because of fault in the timers.

Radio
mechanic by profession, Sattar has confessed that he can make a timer
device within 20 minutes. He has also admitted to his links with
Bhatkal with whom he had come in contact through Abdul Raheem Aftab.
The police sources said that Sattar revealed that Riyaz had visited
Hyderabad in 2007 and stayed at his home.

The police also said
that Sattar was involved in extremist activities since 1995 when he,
along with others, had plotted to kill the then Kerala Chief Minister
EK Nayanar. But later, he fled to Hyderabad and settled down in the
city in 1998 and resided in seven different areas.

While he
had first wife in Kerala, he married second time in Hyderabad and has
two children from the second wife. Police officials said that further
investigations by Bangalore and Kerala police could throw more light on
the network of Indian Mujahideen in the southern region.

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