Hazaribagh, April 26: A two-member team of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) reached the Habibi Nagar blast site today to help district police in their investigations of the accident at the bomb-making den on April 17 that killed at least six men mixing the explosives, the mishap thwarting a nefarious plot to plant bombs in the town scarred by inter-community clashes on Ram Navami day.
The two NIA personnel were experts in explosives, DSP sadar Chandan Kumar Vatsa confirmed.
The NIA has not taken up the Habibi Nagar case but have come to help the police in their investigations on the type of explosives used to get an idea of whether there is a terrorist/ overseas angle.
Reaching Habibi Nagar this afternoon, the NIA team examined the walls of the bomb den which had tell-tale signs of the blast, the blades of a ceiling fan that got damaged in the blast and a flag on the terrace with Urdu inscriptions. They also took photographs.
In another development in the Habibi Nagar case, acting on an input, outpost-1 officer-in-charge Rama Shankar Mishra nabbed an injured in the blast, Ejazul Ansari alias Rinku, from Merhetta village of Churchu block in Hazaribagh this afternoon.
Rinku, who was undergoing treatment for his burns at the house of his father-in-law Riyaz Ansari, pleaded that he only went to the bomb den with food, as he knew Md Ekram, one of the deceased, who was the first to be identified on April 19.
However, the police alleged Rinku was also among the bomb-makers.
At Hazaribagh sadar hospital where the police admitted Rinku today, the injured man pleaded his innocence.
"I knew Ekram, so I went to the house. I was injured in the blast but somehow escaped to my home at Ansari Nagar in town. On April 19, during the two-hour curfew relaxation from 2pm, I went to Amrit Nagar, 5kms away, to my maternal uncle Ayub Ansari, but he did not want to keep me. Then, I went to my father-in-law Riyaz Ansari's house in Merhetta where I was being treated secretly," Rinku told The Telegraph.
Till yesterday, the police maintained nine men were making bombs at the Habibi Nagar house when the explosion occurred. Of the six killed, Ekram's body was found from a nearby septic tank last week while five more bodies were exhumed yesterday from two graveyards, Kheergaon and Sirsi Damodih.
Among the rest three, one has been admitted to RIMS, Ranchi, while nothing is yet known for sure about the whereabouts of the two others.
However, a police source said the body of one of the bodies exhumed yesterday and identified as that of Md Muzaffar may be that of Bhaijan, so far said to be one of the absconders. But, this needed verification, the source added.
With the new revelations, the number of men involved in the Habibi Nagar case could go up in the coming days.
