Police busted a gang of terror suspects wanted across four southern states — Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka — for 12 years and believed to have been involved in the murder of BJP leader from Salem, V Ramesh.
While the ring leader Fakruddin was arrested with two of his accomplices on Friday evening from the outskirts of Chennai, two more gang-members were nabbed by Tamil Nadu police on Saturday after a 10-hour-long gunbattle in Puttur town of Andhra Pradesh’s Chittoor district. In 2011, when senior BJP leader LK Advani was touring Kerala, hours before his yatra, police detected a ‘pipe bomb’ along the route. Fakruddin was the prime suspect in the case.
Within hours of nabbing Fakruddin, acting on a tip off, the police rushed to Puttur and surrounded a house, where the two accomplices – Bilal Malik and Panna Ismail — were holed up. No sooner did the police team, including Andhra Pradesh special police personnel, surround the house, than they encountered gunfire from inside.