Mecca masjid case reopened, Hindu outfit role suspected

After three years of a wild goose chase, the CBI has decided to reopen its investigation into the Mecca Masjid blast following a suspicion that militant Hindu outfit Abhinav Bharat could have been behind the attack.

After three years of a wild goose chase, the CBI has decided to reopen its investigation into the Mecca Masjid blast following a suspicion that militant Hindu outfit Abhinav Bharat could have been behind the attack.

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Fourteen people lost their lives in the blast and its aftermath. Five people were killed in the explosion and nine in police firing at protesters who pelted stones at police personnel after coming out of the mosque in May 2007.

The probe had ‘turned cold’ after the Central Bureau of Investigation got no leads in the case.

The CBI has now drawn links between the blast in Hyderabad and the bomb attack in Ajmer in October 2007.

“The two blasts have a similar pattern and we suspect it is the handiwork of the same group,” said a CBI official, who did not want to be named.

The investigating agency has secured permission from a local court here to bring the two accused in the Ajmer blast case, Devender Gupta and Lokesh Sharma, to Hyderabad to interrogate them in connection with the Mecca Masjid blast.

A team of CBI officials met Hyderabad Police Commissioner A.K. Khan on Friday to seek his help in unearthing the local elements who could have been part of the conspiracy.

The two accused, Devender Gupta and Lokesh Sharma, CBI sources said, had stayed in Hyderabad for almost two months before the blast.

“They could not have planned the thing alone,” said an official.