Five terrorists, including a woman, belonging to the banned Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) were arrested by police from Nala Road under Plant Site Police Station in Rourkela after long hours of fire exchange in the wee hours of Wednesday.
Police have detained the house owner and his son who are being questioned on the matter.
In a joint multi-agency operation, Special Operations Group (SOG), Telengana Police, State Special Tactical Unit and Intelligence Bureau and Rourkela police arrested the five at around 2.30 am from a rented house in Qureshi Mohalla in Nala Road.
The terrorists are aged between 28-34 years and were each carrying a prize money of Rs10 lakh on their head. They were identified as Md Sakil(33), Md Mehboob (27), Amjad Khan (27), Zakir Husain (32), while the woman was identified as Najma Bibi (50). Najama is the mother of Md Mehboob.
The terrorists are residents of Khandwa, Madhya Pradesh and were wanted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA). They were reportedly involved in 17 terror activities around the country. They were involved in Bijnor bomb blasts, inciting communal hatred, several bank robberies and also murdered police officials. They were involved in a recent bank robbery in Sundergarh.
They mainly committed crimes in Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. The police recovered three pistols, seven guns, 20 round live bullets, four knives and seven mobile phones, besides an Indigo car from them
According to police sources, they were staying in Rourkela under false identity and had been planning to loot banks in Chhattisgarh and commit crimes in Rourkela as their funds had been exhausted. They only had Rs 3,000 left by the time they were arrested.
According to sources, the four were staying in Rourkela for the last six months. They have various hideouts around the country, and this was one of them. According to sources, the arrested four youths had a seven member gang, who had broken Khandwa jail in 2013 and while fleeing had killed a police constable. In February 2015, they had looted Rs 48 lakh from Karim Nagar branch and in an encounter at that time, two of their gang members had been killed. They had also killed two policemen. Subsequently, the kingpin of the gang identified as Abu Fazal had been arrested by Madhya Pradesh police.
“The arrested terrorists are SIMI activists,” said Inspector General of Police, Western Range RK Sharma.