Suspected Leader of Bangladesh Terror Outfit Arrested in India

A top operative of a Bangladeshi militant group and suspected mastermind of an explosion at the Buddhist holy site of Bodh Gaya earlier this year has been arrested in southern India, the National Investigation Agency said Tuesday.

An NIA team arrested Mohammed Jahidul Islam, 38, in Ramanagara, near Bengaluru city in the southern state of Karnataka, and recovered electronic devices as well as traces of explosives during a search of his house, an NIA press release said.

A Bangladesh national, Islam was sentenced to life in prison in 2009 for his part in an attack on a police station, but escaped after Jamaat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) militants fired on a prison van and snatched its occupants in a dramatic daylight operation in Mymensingh, in central Bangladesh, in 2014.

An explosives expert who has four aliases – Kausar, Munna, Mizan and Boma Mizan – Islam vanished and became a top JMB operative in India, authorities said.

“He is the mastermind in the Bodh Gaya case. On his directions Mustafizur Rehman alias Shahin, who is his close associate, had arranged and assembled all the explosives for the incident,” the NIA statement said.