Between their claims and chargesheet, police still to join dots on Kazmi’s role

A week from now, journalist Syed Mohammed Ahmad Kazmi, arrested on March 6 for his alleged role in the bomb attack on an Israeli official in the heart of New Delhi, will have spent six months in police and judicial custody.

Named in a chargesheet filed a month ago, Kazmi was accused by Delhi Police of involvement in a criminal conspiracy leading to the February 13 attack on an Israeli embassy vehicle carrying Tal Yehoshua-Koren.

The charges-heet, filed in the court of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Vinod Yadav, also named four Iranian suspects — Hous-hang Afshar Irani, Masoud Sedaghatzadeh, Seyed Ali Mahdiansadr and Mohammed Reza Abolghashemi.

But the charg-esheet, which relates to offences under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Explosive Substances Act and the Indian Penal Code, is inconsistent with the earlier claims of police about Kazmi, events leading to the attack and the probe that followed. Consider:

THE MOBILE PHONE NETWORK

According to the chargesheet, police in Malaysia detained Masoud Sedaghatzadeh a day after the attack. His associate Nourazi Shaya Ali Akbar was also detained. Papers submitted by Additional DCP Sanjeev Yadav claimed that the two men had applied for Indian visas in 2011. In their application, the men had listed three mobile phone numbers — 989123944144, 989125444652 and 982144505272.

Police claimed that mobile number 989123944144 had been in touch with an Indian mobile phone in 2011. The Indian number, 8860484945, was used by Houshang Afshar Irani, the man who is suspected to have planted the bomb on the embassy vehicle. Police said calls between the two numbers were made on April 25, May 4, May 5, May 6 in 2011. Another call happened on January 29, 2012, two weeks before the attack.

On the page that mentions the dates of calls between the two numbers, Additional DCP Yadav also states that Irani used the number 8860484945 to be in touch with Kazmi on the number 9811272415. But the chargesheet does not mention any date or duration of calls between Irani and Kazmi. Nor does it say how many calls were exchanged between the two numbers. Considering that both were Indian mobile phone numbers, it should not have been difficult for police to obtain call detail records.

... contd.

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