A month after formally taking over the investigation in the case, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Wednesday recorded three arrests in connection with the LPG cylinder blast inside a car in the industrial city of Coimbatore on the eve of Deepavali.
With this, the number of arrests in the blast that took place just yards away from the Kottai Eswaran or Sangameshwarar Temple in communally sensitive Ukkadam in Coimbatore has gone up to nine – the Tamil Nadu Police, which probed the case initially, arrested six persons for their alleged links with Jameesha Mubin, the occupant of the car who died instantly.
The three arrested by the NIA have been identified as Umar Faaruq (39) from the Nilgiris, Mohammed Thoufeek (25), and Ferose Khan (28) from Coimbatore.
NIA officials said the probe has revealed that Faaruq and Khan had attended “conspiracy meetings” conducted by Mubeen and added that incriminating literature and books on “radical Islam” were seized from Faaruq.
The NIA formally took over the investigation into the case on October 30 by visiting the temple and interacting with the priests. Police and NIA believe that Mubin may have been on the way to one of his “target places” but nothing has been proved conclusively.
As many as 109 articles, including Potassium Nitrate, Black Powder, matchbox, cracker fuse length of about 2 meters, Nitro Glycerine, PET powder, Aluminium powder, and 9-volt battery, were recovered from Mubin’s residence, after the blast.
The police, which have recovered over 75 kg of explosives from Mubin’s residence and his associates, have been maintaining that they cannot rule out terror angle to the incident.
Jameesha Mubin, the 29-year-old engineering graduate, was killed when one of the LPG cylinders in his Maruti 800 exploded just yards away from the temple on October 23. Police suspect that Mubin stopped the car after seeing police on duty near the temple and the vehicle exploded minutes later.
The incident came weeks after an alert was sounded across the country following a ban on Popular Front of India.