New Delhi. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Friday arrested another accused in the March 1 blast case at Rameswaram Cafe in Bengaluru. This is the fifth arrest in the case. The agency said in a statement that Shoaib Ahmed Mirza (35) alias Chhotu, a resident of Hubli city in Karnataka, has already been convicted in a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror conspiracy case.
The agency said, “Three days after a massive crackdown in four states in the Rameswaram cafe blast case, the NIA on Friday arrested another accused, identified as a former convict in the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror conspiracy case.” The agency said that its investigation revealed that Mirza got involved in this new conspiracy after being released from jail. The investigating agency said that in 2018 he befriended accused Abdul Mathin Taha and introduced him to an online handler, who is suspected to be abroad.
The agency said that Mirza also provided an e-mail ID for communication in code language between the handler and Abdul Mathin Taha. The agency said that Taha was arrested from his hideout in Kolkata (West Bengal) along with co-accused Musavir Hussain Shajib on April 12. During the investigation of the Rameswaram cafe blast on March 1 this year, the NIA has conducted extensive raids at 29 places across India. The statement said that further investigation is going on into the role of the handler and the wider conspiracy behind the blast. Many people were injured in this blast and there was a lot of damage to property.