Hyderabad, May 15: Last Friday, at a religious congregation in the Darulshifa mosque, when prayer leaders spoke of how innocent young men were picked up on suspicion of having a role in the Mecca Masjid blasts of 2007, intelligence agencies registered the vibes and reported them to their bosses.
Around the same time, a youngster was arrested in Dabeerpura after he made a telephone call to the police helpline 100 and informed them that a bomb would go off in the Old City on May 18, anniversary of the Mecca Masjid blasts. Senior officers asked their subordinates not to publicise the arrest lest it send a `wrong’ message.
Ever since reports emanated three weeks ago suggesting the involvement of saffron outfit Abhinav Bharat in the Ajmer Shareef and Mecca Masjid blasts, intel sleuths fanned out in the Old City to sniff for signs of a backlash.
Top sources disclosed to Express that the Mecca Masjid blasts were being discussed during religious congregations in Darulshifa, Saidabad and Akbarbagh, among other places, though not elaborately.
Some of the disgruntled elements blamed the state government, a few others the media but the “common enemy’’ remained the police who were accused of picking up young men, nearly 100 of them, after the blasts and interrogating them.
Faced with this intel, officers sat down and chalked out a plan to tackle the situation, but were focused on the blast anniversary, May 18.
At the back of their minds was the shooting of two constables at Falaknuma last year on May 18, the second anniversary.
Though security arrangements were planned in anticipation of a terror strike or large-scale violence, the killers of constable U Ramesh struck four days earlier, perhaps aware that security would be tightest on May 18.
Intelligence also trickled in about post-Mecca Masjid suspects boiling with anger.
But what came as a surprise was the fact that a few well-known fundamentalist outfits, Tehreek- Tehfooz-Sharia-e-Islam (TTSI) headed by Moulana Naseeru ddin — who was arrested by the Gujarat police for alleged involvement in the killing of former Gujarat home minister Haren Pandya — Darsgah-Jihad-O-Shahadat (DJS) headed by Shaik Mahboob Ali made no statement about the link between the Ajmer and Mecca Masjid bomb blasts. They are normally known to make themselves heard loud when such issues surface.
–Agencies