Darbhanga Railway Blast: NIA files charge sheet against 5 LeT men

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Thursday charge-sheeted five LeT terrorists in connection with the Darbhanga Railway Station Blast case before a special NIA Court in Patna, Bihar.

The charge sheet was filed against Mohd Nasir Khan alias Nasir Malik, Imran Malik, Saleem Ahmed alias Haji Saleem, Kafil Ahmad alias Kafil and Iqbal Mohammed alias Iqbal Kana under sections 120B, 468 and 471 of the IPC, sections 3, 4 and 5 of the Explosive Substances Act, read with sections 16, 17, 18, 18B, 20, 23, 38, 39 and 40 of the UA(P) Act.

The NIA official said that Iqbal Kana is presently living in Lahore, Pakistan.

In June this year a blast took place at Darbhanga Railway Station after which a case was lodged. A few days later, the case was transferred to the NIA.

The NIA investigation revealed that LeT operatives had planned to set ablaze a moving long-distance train by placing incendiary Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs)/parcel bomb in the train so that the whole train catches fire. The Let terrorists had planned huge loss of life of innocent people and damage to the public property.

Hafeez Iqbal alias Kana, the Pakistan based handler was operating the whole incident. He was giving instructions to the other LeT terrorists who were in India.

"Mohd Nasir Khan and Imran Malik made an IED using locally procured chemicals and placed the same in a parcel of clothes. The parcel was booked in Secunderabad-Darbhanga Express. They chose this train since it departed at night. Their intention was to trigger the incendiary IED, the cloth parcel would ignite and further spread fire in other parcels booked in the van converting it into a large conflagration," said an NIA official.

Investigation also revealed that accused Nasir Khan had travelled to Pakistan and was trained in espionage, handling of arms and ammunition and fabricating IEDs. He also received funds from Pakistan on various occasions.

After the incident, the Pakistan based handlers had tried to facilitate the escape of arrested accused to foreign country through Nepal. But they were arrested by the probe agency before they could manage to escape.

The official said that they were still probing the matter.