Sohail Md Sheikh, a Pune-based Lashkar-e-Toiba suspect who was arrested yesterday, has told police that his module had been instructed to draw up a list of Gujarat policemen “who didn’t react sufficiently” during the 2002 riots, sources in the Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) said today.

The ATS today told a Mumbai court that two of the six arrested so far in connection with the July 11 serial blasts case had been trained to make bombs using RDX, Ammonium Nitrate and Fuel Oil—the same combination that was used on Terrible Tuesday. It is not clear if they participated in the bombings.

Told about Sohail’s claim of a “watchlist of Gujarat policemen”, D G Vanjara, Gujarat’s IG (Operations), said: “This is not the first time that such information has come out. A local module with Hyderabad links, which we busted in 2003, had also been given similar instructions.” Members of that module are being tried for the assassination of former Gujarat minister Haren Pandya on March 24, 2003.

ATS sources said Sohail and Zamir Ahmed Latif Chaabiwala, a Worli resident also arrested yesterday, received training in explosives in Muzaffarabad and Bahawalpur.

Sohail, the sources said, told his interrogators that in April 2005, at a camp in Muzaffarabad, he was told by a Lashkar commander to help draw up a list of Gujarat police officers.

ATS chief K P Raghuvanshi said: “This is a well thought out and large conspiracy, and these men were part of the conspiracy. More details about their specific roles will come to light very soon.”

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