Safdar Nagori,the 41-year-old face of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI),has topped a course on value education run in Sabarmati Central Jail,beating suspended encounter cop DG Vanzara who took the same course in jail,by nearly 10 per cent marks. Vanzara is in jail in connection with the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case. Nagori was nabbed from Indore in 2008 after back-to-back serial bombings across cities,attributed to Indian Mujahideen,a breakaway faction of SIMI and self-proclaimed home-grown terror outfit. He was brought to Ahmedabad after serial bomb blasts allegedly carried out by IM rocked the city on July 26,2008,killing 57 people. A compulsive academic,Nagori has a masters degree in journalism from Vikram university in Ujjain where he did a dissertation on Kashmir supporting the separatist movement and also won a gold medal. His name first surfaced in connection with the Samjhauta Express blasts of January 2007 and later in the Mumbai train bombings in July that year and the Bangalore blasts of 2008. He was doing a diploma in mechanical engineering when he came in touch with SIMI and rose through the ranks fast to eventually become SIMIs central advisory committee general secretary in 1991. Born in Nagori colony of Mahidpur town near Ujjain to a crime branch policeman, Nagori was among the first to enroll for the post-graduate diploma course on value education and spirituality offered by Annamalai University in Tamil Nadu,which will give Nagori the certificate,says additional DGP (jails) PC Thakur. The course is taught by the Brahmakumaris in the prison here. He has shown interest in joining some unique courses that we introduced in the prisons. He has topped the batch with a total of 436 out of 500 marks, said Thakur. Nagori scored 87.2 per cent against Vanzaras 77.4 per cent. The course covers spirituality,religion,consciousness and the divine,personality development,meditation,field projects,and values for excellence in life,among other things. The results were declared this week. For the jail inmates at Sabarmati,Nagori is an inaccessible man. He is kept in a cell under strict observation of the prison authorities and taken out only during the timings of his classes,which he attends quite sincerely. According to the jail authorities,Nagori has not missed a single day of training in the period of three months for this course. Nagori is also believed to be lover of books,especially on government,religion and current issues stockpiled in the jails library. Besides topping in value education,he has also enrolled for masters in public administration through Indira Gandhi National Open University along with another Ahmedabad blast accused Jishan Ahmed. So far,57 people have been arrested for the July 26,2008 blasts in Ahmedabad. After SIMI was banned in September 2001,Nagori went underground and shifted base to Mumbai. He stayed in a small flat in Kurla but started organizing SIMI ranks in Uttar Pradesh,Kerala,Karnataka,West Bengal,Gujarat and Rajasthan and is accused of organising terror camps and plotting the serial bombings.
