From letting him off after questioning to delay in issuing a red corner alert numerous procedural lapses have ensured Indian Mujahideen founder Riyaz Bhatkal, wanted in many terror cases including last week's twin blasts in Hyderabad, still remains untraceable. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
Seeking to get more leads into the Pune blast case, the Intelligence Bureau have informed the Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh police to get more clues regarding key man of the Indian Mujahideen, Riyaz Bhatkal.
It has been nearly a week since gangster Chota Rajan made a claim that his men had shot down the notorious terror suspect and Indian Mujahideen founder Riyaz Bhatkal in Karachi. The moment this claim was made, Indian agencies wrote to Pakistan seeking details regarding his 'death,' but till date there has been no confirmation from that end.
The attempts by the Pune police probing the February 13 German Bakery blast to hunt down Riyaz Bhatkal may prove futile, since there is confirmation now that the founder of the Indian Mujahideen is safely tucked in at Karachi.
The IM mastermind's account was created in 2012. Details will be sent to Pakistan to seek his extradition.
Statements made by Peerbhoy and Syed Mohammad Naushad and Ahmed Bawa indicate that it was Riyaz Bhatkal who played a crucial role in the serial blasts.
Yasin Bhatkal, believed to be a relative of Indian Mujahideen founder Riyaz Bhatkal, has been identified by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad as one of the main conspirators of the Pune blast, in which 17 people were killed. Indian Mujahideen is suspected to be behind the blast in Pune's upscale Koregaon Park area, an ATS source said. The ATS, which has submitted a preliminary report on investigations into the terror attack -- the first after the terror siege on Mumbai.
Even as the hunt for Riyaz Bhatkal, who is said to have co-founded the Indian Mujahideen continues, two of his accomplices have revealed that the dreaded terrorist wanted 1,000 people dead in every bomb blast that occurred in the country.
Indian Mujahideen co-founder Riyaz Bhatkal not only used to send funds for terror acts across the country but also regularly provided money to families of the jailed and absconding operatives of the banned outfit, the NIA has told a special court in New Delhi.
Riyaz Bhatkal had reportedly fled with a large amount of money from the IM's coffers. Riyaz, who hails from the coastal town of Bhatkal, was in possession of Rs 38 lakh that was collected through hawala transactions and donations. The money was supposed to be used for terror operations in and around Karnataka.But the blasts near Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore in April, 2010, were not a costly affair at all.
A special court of the National Investigation Agency has issued a non-bailable warrant against the founder of the Indian Mujahideen, Riyaz Bhatkal.
"In 1948, Indian armed forces were in a decisive position to take back Pakistan-occupied Kashmir but then PM Jawaharlal Nehru declared unilateral ceasefire," Amit Shah said. In 1971, Shah said, 93,000 Pakistani soldiers surrendered and India had 15,000 sq km Pakistan territory under control, but still PoK was not taken back. During the 1962 war with China, then PM Nehru bade goodbye to Assam in a speech on Akashvani, he said.
The Telangana High Court upheld a trial court's verdict handing out death penalty to five senior operatives of banned terror outfit, Indian Mujahideen, involved in a bomb blast that left 18 people killed in 2013. The court dismissed the criminal revision appeal filed by the IM operatives while upholding the NIA court's judgment. The five members, including IM co-founder Mohd Ahmed Sidibapa alias Yasin Bhatkal, Pakistani national Zia-ur-Rahman alias Waqas, Asadullah Akhtar alias Haddi, Tahaseen Akhtar alias Monu and Ajaz Shaikh, were convicted in 2016. The special court for NIA cases here awarded capital punishment to five convicts treating it as a rarest of the rare case. The high court, after conducting a detailed hearing in the appeals filed by the convicts, confirmed the death sentence of the five IM operatives.
The highlight of Tuesday's debate on Operation Sindoor was the speech by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with the rebuttal by Congress's Wayanad MP Priyanka Gandhi coming a close second.
Is the film based on the secret mission to capture Indian Mujahideen terrorist Riyaz Bhatkal?
Riyaz Bhatkal's story was very similar to that of Shahid Bilal, who belonged to the Harkat-ul-Jihade Islami. Bilal wanted for his role in the deadly twin blasts in Hyderabad. Both Bhatkal and Bilal were products of the Inter-Services Intelligence's drive to setup a terror module in south India.
After every terror attack in the last three years, names of the usual suspects crop up -- Riyaz Bhatkal, Iqbal Bhatkal, Abdus Subhan alias Tauqeer. This is followed by the information that these men are hiding in a Gulf nation or in Pakistan, and extraditing them to India will not be possible.Riyaz Bhatkal started off as a common thief but is considered a dangerous terrorist today. Ironically, he doesn't feature in the CBI's list of most wanted terrorists.
Is it the end of India's most wanted terrorist Riyaz Bhatkal? Underworld don Chota Rajan has claimed that his aides have killed Riyaz Bhatkal and an associate of his, Anwar, at the Gulshan Iqbal area in Karachi, Pakistan.
The National Investigation Agency on Wednesday filed its charge sheet in a Delhi court against five suspected operatives of terror outfit Indian Mujahideen for their alleged involvement in hatching a conspiracy to carry out terror strikes in the country.
Yasin Bhatkal was 22 when he had his first tryst with terror. The same is the case of his boss Riyaz Bhatkal too. What motivates these operatives? Is it money or ideology?
Given the nature of his job, a terrorist heading an underground organisation usually grooms a successor who is prepared to take over in case of his boss's arrest or demise.
Investigators have discovered that Indian Mujahideen leaders use the alias 'Shah Rukh Khan' to confuse investigators and keep their identities hidden. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
Based on intelligence reports, the Uttar Pradesh police now believe that the masterminds of the Varanasi blast may be Asadullah Akhthar and Dr Shahnawaz. The Bhatkal brothers -- Riyaz and Iqbal -- are also suspected to have helped plan the blast, said sources.According to sources in the Intelligence Bureau, all four suspects are hiding in Sharjah, where the terror attack had been planned.
Terror outfit Indian Mujahideen is back to haunt security agencies in the country. An Intelligence Bureau report indicates that the group, which was wiped out to a large extent in India, is all set for a comeback. There are intercepts to show that cadres recruited for the IM are undergoing heavy training in Pakistan.
A telephonic conversation between two suspected members of terror outfit Indian Mujahideen gave the security agencies clue about the outlawed wing's alleged involvement in triggering the Pune blast, police sources said on Sunday. Days after the German Bakery blast on February 13, in which 17 persons were killed and over 50 injured, alleged IM operative Salman Ansari's telephonic intercepts suggested that he had received a phone call from someone, believed to be Riyaz Bhatkal
Riyaz Bhatkal is the emerging face of the Pune blasts case and the police forces of three different states have been alerted by the Intelligence Bureau about the same. Even as the police of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala try and find out more about this man, let us explore the phenomenal rise of this dreaded terrorist.
The police, who are probing the Varanasi blasts, now say that a fringe group of the outfit has carried out the blasts and the ammunition used were leftovers from arrested IM cadres. They had stocked up IEDs and also a huge quantity of ammonium nitrate which is accessible to these low rung cadres, who are not on the IB's radar and so could slip in and plant the bombs.
Yaseen Bhatkal, a distant relative of Indian Mujhahideen founder Riyaz Bhatkal, has been named the mastermind of the Pune blast by Maharashtra's Anti-Terrorism Squad. A blast in German bakery, one of the city's most popular eateries, had left 17 people dead and many more injured on February 13. Yaseen hails from the coastal town of Bhatkal in Karnataka and has been involved in terror activities since 1998, say sources in the Intelligence Bureau.
One of the suspects, who was nabbed from Kudalwadi area, is believed to have been associated with Indian Mujahideen leader Riyaz Bhatkal during his stay in Pune. The other suspect from Janwadi locality was reportedly associated with Shabbir Gangawali, a cleric linked with Indian Mujahideen.
The serial blasts at Bengaluru were undertaken at the behest of the founder of Indian Mujahideen Riyaz Bhatkal, according to T Naseer, the Lashkar-e-Tayiba operative who was arrested on the Bangladesh border and is being interrogated by the Bengaluru police.
The cracking of the Bangalore serial blasts case has confirmed security agencies' claims about Lashkar-e-Tayiba's links with the dreaded Indian Mujahideen.
'You are dealing with a small gang of semi-literate terrorists. These are guys flying kites.' 'There is huge difference between flying kites and actually having a deliverable, executable, plan.'
Preliminary reports prepared following investigations reveal that Sainuddin, who reported to the elusive Riyaz Bhatkal, was one of the main coordinators between the Students Islamic Movement of India, the Indian Mujahideen and the Lashkar-e-Tayiba.
Long before he became one of the most wanted terrorists in India, Yasin Bhatkal, or Ahmed Siddibapa as he was known back then, was just another student at a school in Bhatkal, a coastal town in Karnataka.
In 1996, the sitting Bharatiya Janata Party MLA, Dr U Chittaranjan, was murdered and this led to communal violence spanning six months, and which claimed 17 lives and damaged property worth Rs 15 crore. Since then, the town has not been the same. The Muslim community in Bhatkal says it was the BJP which has brought about the rift
magistrate that he had assembled the explosives and had "guided" the members of the terror outfit while planting bombs at Hyderabad's Dilsukhnagar area in February last year.
Moshin Chaudhary has been out of news for quite some time. The Pune blasts have now brought this name back in the limelight and the Mumbai ATS has launched a massive manhunt. Moshin Chaudhary, according to several Indian Mujahideen operatives, had taken over the India operations of the IM following the arrest of Safdar Nagori and the fleeing of Abdul Subhan. Chaudhary was closely associated with Riyaz Bhatkal, the founder of the IM.
Threat from the sea continues to loom large over the country and the attack on Mumbai was just a beginning.
Indian Mujahideen leaders Abdul Subhan, Riyaz Bhatkal, Iqbal Bhatkal, Qayamuddin and Shadab Malik are still out there, likely planning their next attack.
Riyaz Bhatkal's name crops up in almost every terror investigation in India, but Indian security agencies are yet to issue an Interpol red corner notice against the terrorist because of a legal loophole.
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