Silchar, Feb 26 A Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) cadre and his three associates were arrested by the Cachar police in different places of southern Assam and Meghalaya, officials said on Wednesday night.
A senior police official said that on February 21, telephonic information received from an employee of Jhandu Infratech Ltd., a company engaged in Highway Construction work, that a man identified himself as a member of the banned terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) called an employee of the company and demanded a ransom of Rs 10 crore.
Demanding ransom to the company, the unknown person threatened dire consequences if the demanded money was not paid within the specific time frame, the official said.
On receipt of the information, Cachar Police registered a case at the Katigorah Police station under Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) and started an investigation.
A Police team on Wednesday arrested two accomplices of the prime accused from the Kalain area. The detainees were identified as Md. Alekuddin (25) and Ajiruddin alias Amiruddin (27) both residents of Katigorah.
During the investigation, police conducted a technical analysis and rigorous interrogation of the accomplices and arrested the prime accused Boktar Hussain (29) along with another associate identified as Samsir Uddin Barbhuiya, (28) from Rymbai village in Meghalaya's East Jaintia Hills district with the help of Meghalaya police.
Hussain is a resident of Kachudaram while Barbhuiya is a resident of Katigorah in the same Cachar district. During the investigation, the mobile handset along with the sim card used for the ransom call was recovered from the prime accused.
Meanwhile, the Assam Police's Special Task Force (STF), as part of its operation 'Praghat', has so far arrested 16 associates of the Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT), a Bangladesh-based terror group affiliated with Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), from Chennai.
The STF since December last year arrested 16 associates, including Bangladesh national Md Sad Radi, of the ABT from Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
According to the STF sources, the 16 detainees, including Bangladeshi nationals, were working under the direction of Md Farhan Israk, a close associate of Jasimuddin Rahmani, the Chief of ABT.
"The ABT sent one Bangladeshi national Md Sad Radi alias Md Shab Sheikh (32) a resident of Rajshahi, Bangladesh, to India to spread their nefarious ideology amongst like-minded people in the country," the sources said.
--IANS
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