The First Class Judicial Magistrate Court in Kannur on Monday left seven of the 21 activists of the Islamist outfit, Popular Front of India (PFI), arrested on April 23 from a secret training camp at Narath, Kannur, in the custody of police till May 3 even as the trial in the case pertaining to the chopping off the right hand of a college professor by PFI men in 2010 started at the NIA Court in Kochi.
Those left in the custody of police included Abdul Aziz of Mattannur, one of the two chief trainers of the camp. A team of Karnataka Police officials had inspected the camp site the other day on the basis of the information that some of those arrested could have been involved in the recent blast outside the BJP office in Bangalore.
Sources in the Kerala Police said that they would seek the custody of the other arrested PFI activists later. The police’s plan is to get the 21 arrested persons in their custody for questioning and evidence-gathering in three groups of seven each as the investigation progresses. One of the two chief trainers, Kamaruddin of Narath, is absconding.
In the raid at the training camp at Narath on April 23, the police had seized several weapons, bombs, bomb-making materials, a human dummy for target-practising, an Iranian identity card, several pamphlets and documents with anti-national content, flags and other articles of the PFI and its political wing, the SDPI, etc.
At the same time, the Kerala Government has recommended an NIA probe in the case considering the extremist and anti-national character of the camp, the materials confiscated from there and the shocking indications gathered by the police with respect to the camp. The State Home Department has reportedly sent a letter in this regard to the Union Home Ministry.
The State took the decision to hand over the probe to the NIA on the basis of a proposal from the DGP. The Government’s letter to the Centre said the seizure of weapons, bombs and the anti-national documents had to be viewed seriously and that the case had several aspects that demanded investigations by specialised teams.
The Kerala Police had in their preliminary investigations found that the camp and those behind it could have been getting external assistance in the form of funds and that some of the PFI activists arrested could have played a role in the recent Bangalore blast. Sources said that the State police had limitations in probing a case of such wide ramifications.
Meanwhile, the in-camera trial in the case pertaining to the brutal attack on TJ Joseph, a college professor from Muvattupuzha in Kerala’s Ernakulam district, in which his right hand was chopped off by Popular Front and SDPI operatives started at the Special NIA Court in Kochi on Monday.
The NIA Court had framed charges against the 29 accused on April 17. The accused were charged under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and Explosive Substances Act and with criminal conspiracy, criminal intimidation, etc. Though 37 persons were chargesheeted in the case, eight are yet to be arrested.
In a Taliban-model attack on the morning of July 4, 2010, a group of Islamists had chopped off Joseph’s right hand when he was returning home after attending the Sunday Mass at a church at Muvattupuzha as ‘punishment’ for setting a test paper which contained certain questions that allegedly blasphemed Prophet Muhammad.