NIA may have got the man behind Delhi HC blast

Has the National Investigating Agency got their man? The premier agency set up to probe incidents of terrorism in India has picked up a youth by the name Waseem Akram Malik, 25, while he was on his way to Dhaka.

Waseem is currently being interrogated regarding his alleged involvement in the Delhi high court blast case which occurred last month.

Although NIA officials are not revealing much about Malik, they just say that he hails from the Kishtwar area of Jammu and Kashmir and certain leads regarding him led to his arrest.

The questioning is on at the moment and he will be produced before the court soon, an NIA official said. We have certain leads and would not like to divulge much at this juncture, but be rest assured that the probe is on the right track, the official added.

Sources, however, added that Waseem is the brother of Junaid Malik who is associated with the Hizbul Mujahideen which has its strengths in the Kashmir Valley.

Waseem, on the other hand, does not have too much of a trail on him and the investigators have not been able to ascertain as of yet whether he is part of the Indian Mujahideen or the Harkat-ul-Jihadi Islami.

The entire plot regarding Waseem Malik came to light following the tapping of his phone calls which were made to several persons. The agency also had questioned a lot of his friends before arresting him.

They believed that Waseem was fleeing to Dhaka when he was arrested. The other leads available were that Waseem was one of the youth who was allegedly involved in the planning of the Delhi blast, which killed 12 people.

They had used the name of the HuJI after the blasts. However, there was no clear link to this outfit and all aspects of the probe were leading up to the Indian Mujahideen.

But the NIA continued to dig deeper into the HuJI link stating that nothing could be ruled out. Some youth of the IM could have used the name of HuJI or this outfit itself could have carried out the attack, agency sources also added.

Regarding Waseem, investigators are trying to find out about the conversation he had with the rest of the members and also his association with the likes of Abid Hussain Bhawani and Amir Abbas Dev who were also allegedly part of the terror plot.

The NIA has questioned at least 75 members from Kishtwar, and during the course of their investigation they found that the entire plan was hatched in this area itself.

Whether the attack was the resurrection of the HuJI or the IM is something only a further probe will tell. In addition to the arrest of Waseem, the NIA also has in its custody three others who were part of the gang which sent out the email after the blasts in which HuJI took responsibility for.

Sources say that the fact that Waseem was going towards Dhaka, the home of the HuJI, is not a sufficient ground to conclude that he is part of that outfit. "He was in the know of the plot and we are trying to ascertain more details regarding the same," the NIA official added.

An MBBS student, Wasim was studying at a medical college in Bangladesh and had come to his hometown a couple of months back.