The Intelligence Bureau and the Delhi Police had alerted the Bihar Police about Indian Mujahideen’s plan to carry out terror attacks at Bodh Gaya’s Mahabodhi temple. The IM operatives nabbed by Delhi Police Special Cell had confessed in October about their design to attack Mahabodhi Temple to avenging atrocities against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.
This confession was made by the IM operatives caught in connection with the Pune blasts in August last year. “We have notified Bihar Police... we have informed them to tighten the security,” Delhi Police chief Neeraj Kumar had said.
In many ways, this was like a blast foretold. On July 2 also, a high-level security meet was conducted in Bodh Gaya to review the security situation. Central Government officials, local police and temple trustees attended the meet.
On Sunday evening, Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde confirmed about this meeting. “Few days back there was a review meeting in Gaya about the temple security. Our officials too attended the meeting and they briefed me,” said Shinde. Sources said the review meeting found that the security of the inner complex carried out by the Mahabodhi temple trust was inadequate and informed the trust management to beef it up. But no one seemed to take the threat perception so seriously.
According to IB officials in Delhi, the information gathered from IM operative was passed on to the DGP of Bihar about the possible attacks by IM.The Delhi Special Cell had busted an IM module which revealed that the group was planning fidayeen attacks on the Mahabodhi temple.
After the Delhi Police alert, NIA team had visited the temple.Sources informed that IM held a meeting in Hyderabad last year at the house of Obaid-ur-Rehman, a key accused in the twin blasts in Hyderabad in February this year. The plan was apparently approved by Riyaz Bhatkal, one of the founders of the Indian Mujahideen, who is believed to be hiding in Pakistan.
Apart from this specific input, IB officials in Delhi claim that they sent another specific alert to the Bihar Police in June also. The alert was about suspected entry of two brothers - Sarful Rahman and Sahidur Rahman - in Bihar in early June. The brothers are believed to be IM operatives. They were in Saudi Arabia for a sometime.