The anti-terrorist squads (ATS) of Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, probing the blast near the Red Fort, on Tuesday raided the Lucknow home of Shaheen Sayeed, one of the three doctors arrested for their alleged involvement in a “white collar” terror module a day before.
Talking to the media outside the house at Kandhari Bazar in Lalbagh, Shaheen’s father Syed Ansari said he was clueless as to why his daughter was being connected to a “terrorist attack”.
“I have three children. Mohammad Shoeb, the eldest among them, lives with me. Shaheen is my second child. She is very talented and has done her MBBS and MD from a college in Allahabad. She took up a job at a college in Faridabad a few years ago and married a doctor. She is committed to helping the poor, and I am unable to understand why the cops are trying to connect her with a terrorist attack,” he told the media.
Syed Ansari said the police also broke into the house of his youngest son, Dr Parvez Ansari, who lives with his family in Madiyahun.
Later at night, Parvez was arrested by the ATS, police sources said. The police are yet to make any official announcement.
“I heard that the police broke the lock of Parvez’s house in the morning and barged in. He is also a responsible citizen and can’t commit any crime,” Syed Ansari told reporters before he was shoved inside the house by some policemen.
Six members of the Jammu and Kashmir ATS quizzed Syed Ansari till late in the evening.
Dr Shaheen was arrested by Delhi police from Faridabad after the bomb blast on Monday. The police claimed she was a friend of Dr Muzammil Ahmad Ganai, who was earlier arrested in connection with the multi-state terror module. Both had links to Al-Falah University in Faridabad. Ganai was allegedly involved in plotting the explosion in Delhi, which claimed at least 12 lives, and large amounts of explosives have been recovered from two of his rented homes in Faridabad.
A professor at the Al-Falah University told NDTV that Shaheen did not adhere to discipline. “She would leave without informing anyone,” the professor said on condition of anonymity.
“Many people used to come to meet her at the college. Her behaviour was often strange. Complaints against her had been made to the management, too,” the professor alleged.
Before swooping on Syed Ansari’s house, the ATS members had broken into Parvez’s house and returned a few hours later after deploying two constables there. Eyewitnesses said the gate was locked from the outside.
Parvez is a teacher at a private medical college in Lucknow.
Sources in Uttar Pradesh police claimed that the Delhi police and the Jammu and Kashmir ATS also raided some houses in Saharanpur and Shamli and took three people into custody.
“They will be interrogated before the cops reach any conclusion concerning their role in the blast,” said an officer in Lucknow.