Author: Express News Service
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: August 31, 2012
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/journalist-among-11-arrested-for-karnataka-terror-plot/995739/0

A junior software engineer in the Defence Research Development Organisation and a journalist working for a leading local English daily are among 11 people arrested by the Bangalore police in an alleged terror plot to attack a rightwing columnist in a prominent Kannada daily, Hindu leaders and politicians.

Bangalore Police’s Central Crime Branch, acting on inputs from Andhra Pradesh counter-intelligence authorities gathered after several weeks of monitoring mobile phone activity, arrested six persons from Bangalore and five from the north Karnataka town of Hubli on August 29. Most of the arrested have family links in Hubli.

Bangalore Police Commissioner Jyothi Prakash Mirji told a press conference on Thursday that the arrested youth were in regular touch with Lashkar-e-Toiba and Harkat-ul-Jehadi-al-Islami (HUJI) operatives in Saudi Arabia in connection with the alleged plot. “Their handlers are based in Saudi Arabia,” Mirji said.

A 7.65 mm pistol and seven bullets have been shown as recovered from the Bangalore house from where six of the 11 were arrested on Wednesday evening. Among them are Muthi-ur-Rehman Siddiqui, 26, a journalist who has been with Deccan Herald for the last three years, Ejaz Mohammed Mirza, 25, a junior engineer in DRDO, his brother Shoaib Ahmed Mirza, 25, a Master’s in computer application, and Mohammed Yousuf Nalband, 28, an electrician.

The others arrested from Bangalore are Abdullah alias Abdul Hakim Jamadar, 25 and Riyaz Ahmed Byahatti, 28.

Among the arrested from Hubli are Obaidullah Imran Bahadur, 24, Mohammed Sadiq Lashkar, 28, Waheed Hussain, 26, Mahaboob Bagalkote, 26, and Dr Jaffar Iqbal Sholapur.

Police sources said that the arrests were a result of monitoring activities of the group over a period by Andhra Pradesh counter-intelligence authorities. One of the main targets of the group was prominent columnist Pratap Simha from the Kannada daily Kannada Prabha, the sources said. Two editors of publications that used Simha’s columns and BJP MP from Hubli, Prahlad Joshi, were also targets, they added.