Acting on a Central Intelligence tip-off, a team of the elite Anti-Terrorist Squad of Uttar Pradesh and 20 commandoes launched an operation in Haji Colony of Kakori area in lucknow and gunned down a suspected terrorist linked to the Tuesday’s Bhopal-Ujjain train blast, in which at least ten people were injured.
UP Additional DG (law and order) Daljit Chaudhary said the slain terrorist belonged to a local group influenced by ISIS. He said two other terror suspects have been arrested from Kanpur and Itawah.
In the wake of the incident the Centre sounded an alert across the country. "We have sounded an alert all over the country," Union Minister of State for Home Hansraj Ahir told reporters in Delhi.
The tip-off about the terrorist hiding in lucknow came after one man suspected to be involved in the train blast was arrested in Kanpur on Tuesday morning. However, his aide managed to escape.
Around 2.15 pm, an ATS team backed by lucknow Police teams cordoned off the densely-populated Haji Colony on the fringes of lucknow and evacuated the local residents before launching the offensive.
After completely cordoning off the area, some members of the ATS team knocked at the door of the house where the suspected terrorist Saiful was holed up. Instead of coming out, he closed the door.
Inspector General ATS Aseem Arun using a megaphone instructed Saiful to surrender, but he started firing at the police shouting that he wanted shahadat (martyrdom). However, the ATS was in no hurry to storm the house, and they waited for the terrorist to run out of ammunition.
In the meantime, Arun called in commandoes from the Bijnore training centre to mop up the operation.
When the gunfire slowed down after 30 minutes, the security forces around 4.30 pm fired tear gas shells inside the room where Saiful was holed up in order to flush him out. When that failed to work, the police team fired chilli bombs, but to no avail.
After waiting for more than half an hour, a small commando team climbed an adjoining house, and drilled off a portion of the house where the terrorist was holed up to gain entry.
Aseem Arun said, "The police gave ample chance to the suspect to surrender but instead he resorted to firing with an automatic gun. We wanted to keep the collateral damage to the minimum and hence were restrained in approach. It appears that only one person was hiding inside the house."