The Kerala Police strongly suspect that it was Tamil Nadu native Abu Backer Siddique, chief of the banned Islamist outfit, Al-Ummah, who had masterminded Tuesday’s explosion at the district headquarters office complex in Malappuram even as the efforts to prepare a sketch of the person suspected of planting the explosive is getting delayed as the lone witness is unable to recall his face.
According to sources, members of the State police’s special investigation probing the Malappuram explosion have visited the house of Siddique, a native of Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu, but his wife told them that he had not been staying there for a long time and that she had no information about his present whereabouts.
The SIT had come to the assumption that Siddique could have masterminded the Malappuram blast considering its similarity with the explosions at Kollam on June 15 and Mysore on August 1 behind which the hand of Al-Ummah was suspected. Siddique is said to have gone into hiding after the explosion at the BJP office in Bangalore in 2013.
Security experts are of the opinion that Siddique had been trying to continue terror operations through a new outfit, The Base Movement, after Al-Ummah had become defunct. The SIT probing the Malappuram blast has received information suggesting that Siddique could be in Saudi Arabia presently and directing terror operations in India from there.
The police had recovered a small cardboard box superscribed “The Base Movement”, a pen drive and pamphlets from the spot of the explosion in Malappuram. The contents of the pamphlets and the pen drive were in the name of The Base Movement, which threatened to avenge the killing of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dari, Uttar Pradesh over the beef controversy. The explosive was placed under a car.
The pen drive had allegedly contained messages conveying threat to the lives of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Central Ministers and senior BJP leaders and it had also contained pictures of spots of strategic importance like the Indian Parliament and Red Fort. The pen drive also revealed that The Base Movement had plans to carry out similar blasts in other places as well.
Considering similarities among the various blasts, the State police force, which is probing the incident in close cooperation with the NIA, has come to the conclusion that the same group could have been behind the blasts at the district collectorate compound in Kollam on June 15, at a court complex in Chittoor, Andhra Pradesh on April 7 and in Mysore on August 1.
Investigators have got clear indications that the ammonium nitrate used in the explosions at Malappuram and Kollam had been sourced from Udupi in southern Karnataka. They have also found that the pressure cooker used to make the improvised explosive device which exploded in Malappuram could not have been bought from Kerala.
Meanwhile, the efforts of the police to prepare a sketch of the person who could have planted the explosive under the car of the District Medical Officer (Homoeopathy) at the Malappuram civil station compound is getting delayed as the lone witness who had seen a person standing at the spot before the explosion has not been able to recall his face.
The police have announced reward for those who provide them with crucial information and evidences on the explosion. The identities of those giving evidences would be kept concealed. At the same time, Additional Director General of Police B Sandhya visited the blast site in Malappuram and assessed the general security situation in the civil station premises.