Srinagar, Jul 2: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Thursday arrested one more accused in connection with Pulwama attack in February 2019 that left 40 CRPF jawans dead.
Officials said that in the continuing investigation of the Pulwama attack case in which 40 CRPF personnel were killed in an IED blast on February 14, 2019, the NIA arrested one more accused, identified as Mohammad Iqbal Rather, a resident of Futlipura, Charar-e-Shareef in Budgam.
They said Rather had allegedly facilitated the movement of Mohammad Umar Farooq, the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) militant and a key conspirator in this case, after he infiltrated into the Indian territory in Jammu region in April, 2018, though the National Highway to south Kashmir. “Farooq, along with others, had assembled the IED used in the attack,” they said.
Rather had been undergoing judicial custody since September, 2018 in another JeM related case investigated by NIA, officials said.
“As such, he was produced by the Jail authorities before the NIA Special Court, Jammu today and was taken into seven days NIA custody for his interrogation,” they said.
They said initial examination has revealed that Rather was in constant touch with Pakistan-based leadership of JeM and was in communication with them over secure messaging applications. “Rather was part of the ‘transportation module’ of Jaish-e-Mohammed,” officials said.
With this arrest, NIA has so far arrested six accused in this case. “Investigation in this case is in progress,” they added.
