The city police, who arrested Samiuddin, 34, a resident of K.G. Halli and an alleged worker of Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) for last week’s D.J. Halli violence, have now uncovered that he was constantly in touch with the accused in the RSS worker Rudresh murder case of 2016 and with members of the recently busted Islamic State (IS)-inspired local terror module Al-Hind over the last few years.
However, both modules are considered to be busted and the new revelation that Samiuddin was constantly in touch with the accused in the two cases will open up the probe into whether there are any remnants of these modules still active and whether the arrested was a part of such modules. “If any of the remnants of these modules are still active, then their role in the D.J. Halli violence will be a matter of interest. The probe is in a very initial stage right now, and a direct link between these cases cannot be drawn now,” said a senior official.
Samiuddin was arrested based on technical evidence that indicated he was at the scene of violence that fateful night. “This person had come to adverse notice of the city police earlier too for his suspected links with fundamentalist modules, but was not arrested for lack of evidence. But a thorough probe into the call detail records (CDR) has now revealed he was in touch with the accused in both cases,” a senior police official said.
RSS worker Rudresh was hacked to death in Shivajinagar in October 2016 and members of Popular Front of India (PFI), an organisation associated with SDPI, were among the arrested. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) had probed the case. The agency had conducted raids at multiple locations across the State in February 2020 and busted a new terror module Al-Hind that was inspired by IS. The NIA chargesheet in the case against 17 suspects, filed in July this year, alleges Mehboob Pasha in association with Khaja Mohideen and Sadiq Basha, had founded Al-Hind at Gurappanapalya to carry out terror attacks in South India for establishing Islamic Khilafat in India and were active from April 2019. The module was in touch with an unidentified IS handler through the dark web and was planning to carry out terror attacks, before it was busted, the chargesheet alleges.
Meanwhile, the D.J. Halli police have arrested one of the prime accused named in the FIR — Wajid, who had been to the police station on the night violence broke out to lodge a complaint against P. Naveen Kumar for the derogatory social media post against Islam, along with SDPI leader Muzammil Pasha and others and later allegedly provoked the mob to turn violent, alleging the police were trying to protect Naveen Kumar. Wajid was formerly associated with Janata Dal (Secular). However, he reportedly quit the party and floated his own local outfit. Wajid had also put up posters on social media saying Pulikeshi Nagar MLA R. Akhanda Srinivasa Murthy had gone missing during the COVID-19 lockdown, which led to a complaint against him. The police had called and counselled him, sources said.
The condition in D.J. Halli remains tense even though it is under control, the ity police said. Commissioner Kamal Pant has extended prohibitory orders in the jurisdiction of D.J. Halli and K.G. Halli police stations till the morning of August 21. It was supposed to end on Tuesday morning.
