KU bomb blast: 3 former students arrested

The suspects are said to be part of IJT’s “angry group”, Punjabi Mujahideen.

KARACHI: The police’s Special Investigation Unit (SIU) claimed to have arrested on Wednesday three suspects of the Karachi University bomb blast.

The suspects include Muhammad Omer alias chhota, son of Muhammad Aslam, Hafeezullah alias Bilal, son of Naimatullah Khan and Syed Faiz Ali, son of Syed Musaddiq Ali Shah. They are said to be former students of the university and they were running their own group with the name ‘Punjabi Mujahideen’.

At least five Imamia Student Organisation (ISO) members were injured in a low-intensity bomb blast outside the university’s boys’ cafeteria during Zuhr prayers on December 28, 2010.

The arrests were made after a brief police encounter when the suspects passed by the Lucky Pahari, on Hub River Road in a high-roof  van, officials revealed. Two hand grenades, one Kalashnikov, two repeater guns and two TT pistols were also seized.

According to the Bomb Disposal Squad, 200 grammes of explosive material was used and the bomb was detonated with a mobile phone. No serious harm was caused as the bomb was off-target.

Officials said the SIU picked up one suspect, Muhammad Faiz, a resident of North Karachi, when he was returning home after offering his Fajr prayers on Friday. Meanwhile, the other two suspects were arrested from outside Karachi University on Saturday.

SIU chief SSP Raja Omer Khattab said that after the preliminary investigation, the case was transferred to the unit after which, he formed a special team led by DSP Ali Raza who managed to arrest the bomb-blast suspects.

He said the suspects are former KU students and had not completed their education. They belong to the “angry group” of Jamaat-e-Islami’s student wing Islami Jamiat-e-Talaba (IJT). “They are trained in Waziristan and Miranshah. They know how to operate and assemble rocket launchers, Kalashnikovs, machineguns, TT pistols and hand grenades.”

The officer said that during initial interrogation, the suspects confessed that the dismissed workers of the IJT in 2007 formed the Punjabi Mujahideen group which comprises about 150 active and inactive students - with 25 “hardcore members”.

The group wants to meet the aims of the Waheed brothers —Dr Akmal Waheed and Arshad Waheed — who were arrested for harbouring al Qaeda-linked Jundullah activists. The suspects have confessed they attempted to derail the country’s security forces and that they support the policies of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, he said.

According to SSP Khattab, the suspects also confessed to have planned the blast on November 25 to target the ISO men inside the university. They had met their accomplices at the house of Ehsan, a group member, in Buffer Zone to map out the plan. They captured a video footage of the area around the cafeteria before planting the bomb. The following day, they planted it in a concrete block connected to a mobile phone tied to a tree. The accused Omer detonated the bomb. Another accomplice, Shahid Khan, who resides in Gulshan-e-Hadeed, allegedly provided the bomb to them.

The SIU chief said that some of the accomplices, Zuhair Imtiaz, Omair Imtiaz, Aazib Imtiaz, Misbah Usmani, Muhammad Shabbir, Imran Nazir and Samiullah had earlier been killed in drone attacks. The group’s other members are said to be spread across the city, including Model Colony, Gulshan-e-Hadeed, Baldia Town, Nazimabad and Shadman.

Published in The  Express tribune, January 13^th, 2011.