2 Kashmiri students in 14-day judicial custody

Ajay Joshi

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, November 20

After the prolonged investigation of the two Kashmiri students, Fazil Bashar (23) and Shahid Qayoom (22), in the police remand, the Judicial Magistrate here on Tuesday directed the investigation team to send them to judicial remand.

Both accused, who have reportedly carried out the Maqsudan blast, will be in judicial custody for 14 days as the police could not produce valid evidences against them. An FIR under Section 307, IPC, and the Explosives Act was registered against them.

Meanwhile, defence lawyer KS Hundal termed the arrest of the Kashmiri students in the Maqsudan blast incident as an “untraceable case” and said every theory narrated by the police was cooked up as there was no scientific evidence against the accused.

Investigation officer ACP Navneet Singh Mahal said both students were arrested on prima facie facts only and nothing concrete came out during the 16-day investigation.

However, the lawyer also denied the validity of the police version that the students had confessed about their involvement in the low-intensity blast incident.

The lawyer, with the past experience of having handled such cases, said: “He has a strong intuition that the arrested students are innocent as stories crafted by the police lead to nowhere and even after the extended investigation period, the police, including national investigation teams, failed to nab their absconding accomplices Mir Ravoof Ahmed, alias Rouf, and Mir Umar Ramzan, alias Gazi, as claimed by the police.”

Earlier, the remand of the two students was extended up to November 20 and the police could not locate the whereabouts of their accomplices, Rouf, and Gazi. All four have been allegedly booked for carrying out the Maqsudan police station bomb blast that occurred on September 14 this year.

Moreover, newer faces had also been added to the investigation. Mahal said the arrested duo revealed information about Amir Jalan, who was equally involved in the case and had handed over the low-intensity explosives to Fazil and Shahid.

A team of officers was sent to the valley and the Kashmir police have also been included to search Rouf, Gazi and Amir but to no avail. Reportedly, all six persons are associated with Zakir-led Ansari Ghazwat-ul-Hind (AGH), a valley-based terror outfit, having close links with the Jaish-e-Mohammed.