Hyderabad terror suspects in Karachi project

U Sudhakar Reddy

Hyderabad is a hot spot for terror recruitments, say counter-intelligence sleuths. The capture of terror recruiter Shaik Khwaja alias Amjad last month, the man who admitted he had reconnoitered Hyderabad and its oil storage depots, has raised fears that the city’s five year long tryst with terror is set to continue. And that Pune is just a pointer of more to come.Khwaja of Moosrambagh, Hyderabad, linked to both the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT) and the HuJI, is wanted for his involvement in the October 2006 suicide bombing at the Hyderabad Police Task Force office - where the bomber and a constable died - and the Kolkata fake Indian currency notes case.Khwaja’s confessions that he had recruited youth from Hyderabad and Maharashtra for the Pakistan-based LeT, was an eye-opener. He had seen several “missing” Hyderabadi youth in the terror camps in Karachi and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. When the Mumbai Anti-Terror Squad (ATS) came to interrogate him, he reportedly even identified terror suspects from pictures shown to him.Khwaja confessed to cops that he, another absconding terrorist belonging to the Indian Mujahideen (IM), Bada Sajid from Hyderabad, and Amir Reza Khan were present when a retired officer of the Pakistan Army showed them video clippings of the Osho Ashram of Pune (German Bakery that was blown up in Pune on February 13 is located near the ashram), the Blue Synagogue in Mumbai and the RSS headquarters in Nagpur and in Kolkata, oil refineries in Chennai and Hyderabad and the headquarters of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) in Delhi. Khwaja also said LeT operatives conducted a recce on Gujarat and Hyderabad police HQ in a plot to bomb them.Khwaja’s confessions only serve to re-confirm that the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT) and Harkat-ul Mujahideen Islami (HuJI) of Bangladesh have strong links in Hyderabad. The ’Karachi connection’ of 21 missing terror suspects from Hyderabad is the biggest worry for the cops after it emerged that the Pune blasts may have been carried out as part of the Karachi Project with the involvement of absconding or new recruits of the Indian Mujahideen, guided by the LeT. With the several national institutes and defence installations, the communally sensitive Hyderabad has the added lure for terrorists of being an IT hub. The city has always been on the terror radar.