Arrested IM man knew blast was planned in Pune

Arrested Indian Mujahideen (IM) operative Shahzad Ahmad alias Pappu knew Pune would be attacked “soon”.

Arrested Indian Mujahideen (IM) operative Shahzad Ahmad alias Pappu knew Pune would be attacked “soon”.

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When and by whom, he did not know.

Shahzad (21), who is in the custody of the Delhi police, said this when questioned after the February 13 Pune blast.

During questioning, Shahzad said he also knew about four places in Mumbai and Navi Mumbai surveyed by other IM operatives for future attacks.

The IM operative had escaped the 2008 Batla House encounter in Delhi and was arrested on February 1 from Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh.

On Thursday, a Delhi court remanded him to police custody for seven days. He may be brought to Maharashtra soon.

Shahzad is the latest IM catch and the only link investigators have to identify the planners or the planters of the Pune blast.

“He had visited Mumbai,” said Alok Kumar, Delhi’s deputy commissioner of police. Shahzad told interrogators that he visited Mumbai seven months ago at the behest of his Pakistan-based handler, to meet one Kasim in Andheri who was to help him set up a cellphone recharge shop. He was to have assumed another identity, investigators said.

“I was told he [Kasim] would call me. When I reached Mumbai, he never called,” Shahzad told interrogators.