News Analysis India

Tag: Anti Terrorist Squad

  • Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad hands over Teesta Setalvad to Ahmedabad crime branch

    By PTI

    AHMEDABAD: A day after detaining social activist Teesta Setalvad in Mumbai, the Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) handed her over to Ahmedabad crime branch early on Sunday in connection with a fresh case of forgery, criminal conspiracy and insulting criminal proceedings to cause injury registered against her.

    Setalvad was detained from her house in Juhu area of Mumbai on Saturday afternoon after an FIR was registered against her at the Ahmedabad crime branch earlier in the day based on a complaint lodged by a crime branch inspector D B Barad.

    “After being brought here, Setalvad was handed over to the city crime branch on Sunday morning. She will soon be placed under arrest,” a crime branch source said.

    After her detention on Saturday, she had been taken to the Santacruz police station in Mumbai for informing the local police about her detention.

    ALSO READ: Gujarat ATS detains activist Teesta Setalvad in Mumbai day after SC verdict on 2002 riots

    From there, the Gujarat police squad brought her to Ahmedabad by road, where they reached in the early hours.

    The action against Setalvad had come a day after the Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a petition challenging the clean chit given by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to former Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and others in the 2002 post-Godhra riots cases.

    Setalvad, who is the secretary of NGO Citizens for Justice and Peace, is also accused of conspiring to fabricate facts and documents, tutor witnesses and abuse the process of law by fabricating false evidence to frame people, on the basis of submissions made before the SIT formed by the Supreme Court to investigate the 2002 Gujarat riots cases and before the Justice Nanavati-Shah Commission of Inquiry.

    Setalvad and her NGO were co-petitioner with Zakia Jafri in the petition filed against Modi and others in the Supreme Court.

    However, the apex court dismissed the petition on Friday and upheld the clean chit given to Modi and others. Jafri’s husband and former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri was killed during the riots.

    ALSO READ: Amit Shah lashes out at Teesta Setalvad after SC dismisses plea challenging clean chit to PM Modi

    The FIR registered Setalvad was detained on the basis of an FIR registered on Saturday which accused her and two former IPS officers – R B Sreekumar and Sanjiv Bhatt – of forgery, criminal conspiracy, instituting criminal proceedings to cause injury, among others.

    Former DGP Sreekumar was arrested, while Bhatt is currently lodged in a jail after being convicted to life imprisonment in a custodial death case.

    In another case, he has also been charged of planting contraband to frame a lawyer. After her detention, Setalvad claimed her “arrest” was illegal and apprehended threat to her life.

    The FIR was registered under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 468, 471 (forgery), 194 (giving or fabricating false evidence with intent to procure conviction of capital offence), 211 (institute criminal proceedings to cause injury), 218 (public servant framing incorrect record or writing with intent to save person from punishment or property from forfeiture), and 120 (B) (criminal conspiracy).

    In its judgment passed on Friday, the Supreme Court had observed, “At the end of the day, it appears to us that a coalesced effort of the disgruntled officials of the State of Gujarat along with others was to create sensation by making revelations which were false to their own knowledge.”

    “The falsity of their claims had been fully exposed by the SIT after a thorough investigation. As a matter of fact, all those involved in such abuse of process need to be in the dock and proceed in accordance with law,” it had said.

    In its judgment, the apex court also noted the objections raised by the respondents on Setalvad as joining as petitioner number two in the plea after Jafri.

    The respondents objected on the grounds of Setalvad’s “antecedents” and also for her “ulterior design by exploiting the emotions and sentiments of appellant – Zakia Jafri, the real victim of the circumstances..”

  • On the run for 29 yrs, four wanted for serial blasts held in Gujarat

    Express News Service

    AHMEDABAD:  Nearly three decades after the Bombay serial bomb blasts, the Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) has arrested four persons from Sardarnagar in Ahmedabad for their alleged involvement in one of India’s worst terror attacks.

    An ATS officer said the four — Abu Bakar, Saiyyad Qureshi, Yusuf Bhatka, and Shoib Qureshi — were detained initially and later booked for possessing forged passports. They were later sent to eight-day police custody by a court. 

    “Abu Bakar was using the identity of Javed Basha from Karnataka while Saiyyad Qureshi had taken the alias of Saiyyad Sharif from Chennai. Shoib Qureshi and Yusuf Bhatka posed as Saiyyad Yasin from Karnataka and Yusuf Ismail from Mumbai. After their real identity was revealed, we found that they were involved in the 1993 serial bomb blasts,” ATS Deputy Superintendent Kanu K Patel said.

    Over 250 people were killed and another 700 were injured in the series of coordinated blasts that had shaken India’s financial capital on March 12, 1993. The four had travelled to Pakistan for weapons training and had left India after the terror attack, Patel said. 

    “They earlier worked in the gang of Mumbai-based smuggler Mohammad Dossa from 1980 to 1990. Later, they got in touch with Dawood Ibrahim. In February 1993, they travelled to the Middle East and met Dawood,’’ he said. ‘‘On Dawood’s instruction, they reached Pakistan illegally to get trained on handling weapons and improvised explosives with the help of Pakistan spy agency ISI.” 

    After the serial blasts, Abu Bakar was responsible for disposing of a consignment of weapons that had arrived via sea route in Maharashtra. “The four accused then forged documents to make passports and went to Middle East countries such as Saudi Arabia and Oman. They recently returned to India and had come to Ahmedabad,” Patel said.

    ATS officials said that the four accused will be handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation, which is investigating the high-profile case after their remand period gets over.  

  • Uttar Pradesh ATS makes one more arrest in religious conversion case

    By PTI

    NOIDA: The Anti Terrorist Squad of the Uttar Pradesh police on Sunday said it has arrested one more accused in connection with the illegal religious conversion case, taking the number of arrests in the matter to 16.

    The latest arrest is that of a Delhi-based man, who was held from Noida on Saturday, after it was found that he was in contact with others involved in the conversion syndicate, the Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS) said.

    “Accused Abdullah Umar Gautam, who lived in Jamia Nagar area of Delhi, was constantly in touch with the people who have been arrested in the past in connection with the conversion case. He would distribute the funds received from foreign countries among the converted people,” the ATS said in a statement.

    “He was connected to other accused, including Jahangir Alam, Kausar Alam, Faraz Shah, and looked after the work of Al-Farukhi Madrasa and Mosque and running of the Islamic Dawah Centre in Delhi, both of which were managed by his father cleric Umar Gautam,” the agency said.

    So far, 16 people, including key accused clerics Umar Gautam, Kaleem Siddiqui, have been arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police in connection with the case lodged at the ATS Police Station in Lucknow, officials said.

    Around half a dozen accused are from Maharashtra network of the syndicate, they added.

    According to the ATS, bank account details of Abdullah Umar Gautam showed receipt of money from the same foreign sources as did the accounts of his father Umar Gautam.

    “An amount of Rs 75 lakh was credited to Abdullah’s accounts from various sources so far, of which Rs 17 lakh came from foreign locations. This fund was used by him, his father and other associates to distribute among converted people,” the ATS said.

    The illegal religious conversion syndicate being probed by the UP police has links in multiple states, including Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Delhi, the officials said.

    Funding for the syndicate has been received from foreign locations, including the US, the UK and Gulf countries through hawala and other illegal channels, the officials added.