A day after the Union Home Ministry took on the Bihar Police for its “lackadaisical attitude” in handling the security at Patna rally, the State police on Wednesday claimed to have found evidences which indicated parallel between both the Patna and Bodh Gaya blasts. The Patna Police also formally handed over the rally blasts case to the central investigating agency NIA.
“Sufficient documentary evidences found in both the blasts cases of Patna and Bodh Gaya are identical and there might be a possible link between both the blasts leading to the role of the Indian Mujahideen”, said Bihar Director General of Police Abhayanand. He also claimed similar other evidences too have been found in searches in Ranchi recently.
Earlier, the NIA had said that with the evidences found and corroborated by the alleged IM operatives arrested in connection with the Patna blasts case, the Bodh Gaya blast case has now almost been solved. Both the cases were the handiwork of Indian Mujahideen operatives, said the investigating agency officials.
The Bihar Police chief too said that conspiracies for both the blasts were hatched in Ranchi. “Many mobile numbers have been tracked and many persons have been interrogated in both the cases which indicated the hand of similar outfit,” he said while adding that no human bomb was used in the Patna blasts case.
Police chief Abhayanand, however, also defended the Bihar Police saying that there was no laxity on its part and the police did its job as required. The Bihar Police on Wednesday also officially handed over the Patna serial blasts case to the NIA.
However, earlier, the Union Home Ministry charged the Bihar Police for its “lackadaisical attitude” for handling security at the Patna rally.
“live bombs were found at the venue after the serial blasts. live bombs were found a day after the blasts. live bombs were found two days after the blasts and live bombs were found three days after the blasts,” wondered a Home Ministry official expressing serious concern over the alleged carelessness of Bihar Police.
“Gandhi Maidan in Patna which was the venue for the rally, is a site of hardly 800m x 300m size and it should not be difficult for any police force to scan it before a public function but live bombs were found for three days after the blasts…it shows how they (Bihar Police) handled the security at the venue,” said the official.
Earlier, a team of Union Home Ministry had visited Patna after the serial blasts and had found that even the area from where Modi was to address the rally was not sanitised properly and “even anti-sabotage drill was not done”. Meanwhile a fresh round of political war over arrests of alleged IM operatives in the State has been erupted between the JD(U) and the BJP leaders as senior JD(U) leader Shivanand Tiwari said that there should be dialogue with the arrested youths to know why they were into such extremist activities.
“Unse baat chit ki jani chahiye ki kyon wo is tarah ki activities mein shamil ho rahe hain,” said the JD(U) leader and party Rajya Sabha member Shivanand Tiwari. His party colleague Devesh Chandra Thakur, though, stunned others when he addressed the alleged IM operative arrested earlier from Indo-Nepal border, Yasin Bhatkal with respect.