Delhi averts terror, two Lashkar men arrested

The Delhi Police on Wednesday said two Lashkar-e-Toiba operatives planning to strike at one or more locations in the city had been arrested. HT reports. Prime target | Terror trail | Jharkhand connection

The capital has escaped a potentially major terrorist attack in the days leading up to Holi. The Delhi Police on Wednesday said two Lashkar-e-Toiba operatives planning to strike at one or more locations in the city had been arrested.

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The arrests came just four months after a foiled Lashkar plan to target Delhi around Diwali last year, when a car packed with RDX was found abandoned in Ambala.

In the latest case, one suspect was arrested from a house in south Delhi's Tughlakabad Extension. The second, on a Delhi Police tip-off, was picked up on Wednesday from Hazaribagh in Jharkhand.

Delhi Police chief BK Gupta didn't name the suspects, but sources identified them as Ehtesaan and Safaqat. Both are Indians and in their twenties.

"Incriminating documents and material were found from the two men. An operation is on to arrest two other members of their module," Gupta said.

A flash drive, a sheet with coded messages, mobile phones and sulphur and nitrate-based explosives were seized. The flash drive allegedly has images of the suspects assembling explosives and emulating Osama bin Laden's style of firing an automatic rifle as seen in a popular video.

Home minister P Chidambaram said the operatives, who have been sent to 10-day police custody, were planning to bomb a crowded locality.

According to a Delhi Police special cell officer, "One of the men visited Pakistan in December last year for training in explosive devices and sophisticated weapons."

The Jharkhand Police said both the suspects had stayed in Hazaribagh as students for several years.

Terror trail | Jharkhand connection