NIA arrests ex-Lashkar terror case convict Shoaib Ahmed Mirza in connection with Rameshwaram Cafe blast
The National Investigation Agency (NIA), probing the Rameshwaram Cafe blast, on Friday, arrested Shoaib Ahmed Mirza alias Chhotu, who was earlier convicted in a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror conspiracy case of 2012. According to officials, Shoaib Ahmed Mirza alias Chhotu, 35, a resident of Hubballi City in Karnataka, was taken into custody under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) for assisting the mastermind of the Rameshwaram Cafe blast.
He is the fifth accused to be arrested in the case after Abdul Matheen Taha (the main planner), Mussavir Hussain Shazib, the bomber, Muzammil Shareef, who provided logistics like SIM, cellphones, etc, and Maaz Muneer Ahmed. Taha, Shazib, Shareef, and Ahmed are associated with ISIS “Thirthahalli module”, named after the town in Shivamogga from where they operated. An IED explosion rocked the Rameshwaram Cafe in Bengaluru, on March 1, injuring at least 10 people.
Mirza and 10 other members of a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) conspiracy case were raided by the federal anti-terror probe agency on Tuesday to get clues on the Rameshwaram Cafe blast following which Mirza and other members of the LeT conspiracy case were detained and called for questioning over the last three days.
“Three days after a massive crackdown across four states in the Rameshwaram Café blast case, the NIA on Friday arrested one more accused, identified as an ex-convict in a LeT terror conspiracy case. Shoaib Ahmed Mirza is the fifth accused to be arrested in the case,” an agency spokesperson said in a statement on Friday. The spokesperson said Mirza “had got involved in this fresh conspiracy after being released from jail”.
“In 2018, he befriended and introduced accused Taha to an online handler suspected to be abroad. Mirza had further provided an e-mail ID for encrypted communication between the handler and Taha, who was arrested earlier on April 12 from his hideout in Kolkata (West Bengal) along with co-accused Shazib”, the spokesperson added.
The LeT terror conspiracy case of 2012 pertains to information received by the City Crime Branch, Bengaluru, that members of LeT and Harkat-ul-Jehad-E-Islami (HuJI) have hatched a conspiracy to indulge in subversive activities like target killings of important personalities of the Hindu community in Bengaluru and Hubballi and thereby disturb the communal harmony. Surveillance was arranged over the activities of the suspected members. The Bengaluru police filed a case in the matter in August 2012 and it was taken over by the NIA in November of the same year.
Other members in the LeT conspiracy case were identified as Abdul Hakeem, Riyaz Ahmed, Mohammad Akram, Ubeullah Bahadur, Waheed Hussain, Dr Zafar Iqbal Sholapur, Mohammad Sadiq Lashkar, Mehboob Bagalkote, Zakir, Obaid-Ur-Rehman, Nayueem Siddique, Dr Imran Ahmed and Syed Tanzeem Ahmed.
In September 2016, a court convicted Mirza and 12 others in the case. He was released on bail in 2018 and later helped Taha. Mirza introduced Taha to his online handler. The handler is suspected of using the codename ‘Colonel’ who operates from somewhere in the Middle East and has linked with ISI.
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