Armed with the confessional statement of an alleged Pakistani LeT operative, NIA on Wednesday blamed the banned terror organisation for fuelling the continuing unrest in Kashmir. The anti-terror probe agency also said it is gathering further evidence regarding the role of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba in the ongoing turbulence in the Valley for the last 33 days.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) said the questioning of Pakistani terrorist Bahadur Ali, who was captured recently in North Kashmir, had thrown up leads showing involvement of LeT in aggravating the situation in the Valley.
The NIA’s comments came a day after India handed over a “strong demarche” to Pakistan over its continued support to cross-border terrorism in India.
“NIA is further investigating the role of Lashkar in the present unrest in Kashmir,” Inspector General of NIA Sanjeev Singh told reporters in New Delhi.
NIA also showed to the media a video of Ali alias Saifullah, a Punjabi-speaking man, talking about his family, the time he spent in the terror outfit and his crossing over to the Indian side of the border. He was arrested on July 25 by the state police from a village in Handwara after he had managed to give Indian Army the slip at the Line of Control in June this year.
Ali told his interrogators that he was informed by his handlers from a control room code-named ‘Alpha-3’, believed to located at a high altitude somewhere in PoK, about the unrest in the Valley following the killing of Burhan Wani, a Hizbul Mujahideen militant on July 8.
His handlers from the control room asked him to throw grenades at the security forces and also informed him that other cadres of the terror group had managed to sneak into the Valley, mingled with protesters at other places and were fuelling tension in the Valley.
This is for the first time that NIA has shown a video statement of a captured militant. Pakistan had earlier this year shown a video statement of Kulbhushan Yadav, an Indian national allegedly arrested in Balochistan in March over charges of spying for the Indian intelligence agency.
India has maintained that Jadhav is not a serving officer and is not a spy. India suspects Jadhav was arrested from Iran where he had gone for his business. India’s requests for consular access to have been denied by Pakistan too.
On the other hand, the Ministry of External Affairs said that arrested Pakistani national Bahadur Ali, in a letter addressed to the Pakistan High Commissioner in New Delhi, has requested legal aid and assistance to meet his family.
“We are prepared to grant the Pakistan High Commission consular access to Bahadur Ali,” the MEA demarche said. (Inputs: PTI)
Video Editor: Ashutosh Bhardwaj