NEW DELHI and KOLKATA: Through the smoke and fumes of the exploded bombs of Burdwan has emerged a chilling silhouette of that defines a new cartography of terror. After the explosions in a nondescript house in Khagragarh, West Bengal on Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday, which killed two Bangladeshi Al-Qaeda bombmakers affiliated to the terrorist outfit Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), a dark picture of West Bengal as India’s new terror hub has emerged. A day after taking over the probe in Burdwan terror blast, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) team led by SP Vikram Khalate knocked on the doors of Qader Sheikh, brother-in-law of Shakil Ahmed, the suspected terrorist who died in the accidental explosion.
The raid unearthed documents similar to the jihadi material, which was partially burnt by the terror widows Raziya Bibi and Amina Bibi. Subsequent arrests and scrutiny of the call records of the terrorists unravels the strategy of Al-Qaeda and JMB in India to create Islamist terror modules in West Bengal to carry out attacks across the country; in Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir. Senior sources in the Intelligence Bureau and R&AW, which have launched a fresh probe points out that West Bengal is turning into one of the leading arenas for terror recruitment after successful crackdowns on insurgent factories in Bihar and UP, thereby blunting the jihadi effort. Although agencies know that West Bengal has been a safe haven for Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorists, the recent terror activities documented by South Asian Terrorism Portal (SATP) reveals at least one terrorism-related arrest or swoop down happens every month in West Bengal. Since January this year, at least 39 terror related incidents has been reported in the state, superseding the Red menace.
NATIONWIDE FOOTPRINT The terror map has spread. Assam’s Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) SN Singh told The Sunday Standard that they have rounded up six terror modules from Barpeta, suspected to have links with Al-Qaeda and JMB and are entrenched with the Burdwan module. Singh said they have interrogated all six suspects and it is clear that they were indoctrinated in the same seminary where the two terrorists killed in the Burdwan blast were trained as bomb makers. “The terrorists we picked up were not given any task by their senior leaders in Bangladesh. They were asked to stay put in safe houses until their missions were assigned,” Singh added.
According to Intelligence sources, the mastermind behind this large operation to recruit “jihadis” and execute the terror attacks is Abdul Qader Sultan Armar, who hails from the coastal town of Bhatkal in Karnataka, and is presently operating from Waziristan near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Central intelligence agencies who carried out investigations in various places in Burdwan district have collected evidences of a “multi-nation terror module” and exchange programmes between Islamic terror outfits of India and Bangladesh. Abdul with his brother Shafi were trained at Al-Qaeda camps in Bangladesh and Pakistan. A chat between IM’s Asadullah Akhtar and Mirza Shadab Beg, intercepted on June 7 suggests that IM was getting `15 crore from a party in Kolkata as terror funds.
TARGETING POLITICAL PARTIES
Just a week before the Burdwan blasts, on September 24, Intelligence Bureau had warned the West Bengal government that jihadis may carry out terror attacks on religious, commercial and offices of certain political parties in the state in the wake of Al-Qaeda’s call to launch its Indian outfit. The input referred to the NIA probe in February 2014, which points out that IM and the SIMI, with terrorists supported by JMB are using safe houses in the state to reorganise their modules. The house in Khagragarh contained “jihadi” literature including propaganda material, campaign videotapes with footage from Al Qaeda training camps and were dubbed in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Tamil.
Police found the rocket launcher that was being constructed was 80 per cent completed. Officials believe terrorists are using rented accommodation as arms factories. Central agencies have recovered a CD recording of the detonation process of the West Bengal police.
In April itself, the Intelligence Bureau had warned the Mamata Banerjee government that a group of Rohingya Muslims sheltered by ISI in Karachi may carry out terror attacks in West Bengal. This was also documented in the NIA probe against the IM network in which Riyaz Bhatkal, the IM founder was listed as telling a local module that the Rohingyas are seeking funds from the ISI and Hafiz Saeed to launch attacks in West Bengal. IB had intercepted Rohingiya terror chatter requesting funds from ISI and Hafeez Saeed.
The ISI’s plan, going back two years, was to infiltrate TMC, gain the support of Muslim population in West Bengal through Jamaat and get trained terrorists from Bangladesh to go on missions.