NEW DELHI
Three days after the arrest of an alleged Pakistani national found with explosives, two more alleged Pakistanis were arrested late on Wednesday from Gorakhpur city in India’s biggest state Uttar Pradesh with a huge cache of arms, Indian media reported Thursday.
The alleged Pakistani nationals, identified as Barkat and Muzammil, were reportedly carrying two AK-47s and four pistols. Unnamed senior officials told Indian media that the two were carrying enough arms and ammunition to kill as many as 100 people.
There are conflicting reports about the name of the alleged Pakistani nationals. One popular news channel identified the duo as Murtaza and Owais.
The suspects are allegedly part of Indian Mujahideen, which was planning to target senior political leaders as a "human bomb" ahead of next month’s national elections.
"We were given some leads by the crime branch of the Delhi Police after the arrest of Indian Mujahideen operative Tehseen Akhtar, and the arrests in Gorakhpur are a fall out of this tip off," a police official informed Indo-Asian News Service.
Wednesday’s arrest is the third major anti-terror arrests in the last five days ahead of the national election.
On Tuesday, Indian police officials arrested 23-year-old Tehseen Akhtar, the alleged mastermind of the Indian Mujahideen near the India-Nepal border claiming a major breakthrough in some of the recent bomb blasts in the country.
On Sunday, police officials arrested Zia-ur-Rahman, better known as Waqas, an alleged Pakistani national and a suspected member of the Indian Mujahideen along with three other operatives from Ajmer in Rajasthan state.
By Mubasshir Mushtaq
englishnews@aa.com.tr
