Parliament breach accused wanted to create anarchy to force govt to meet their unjust and illegal demands: police

Jha’s remand paper stated: “Accused Lalit has disclosed that they wanted to create anarchy in the country so that they can compel the government to meet their unjust and illegal demands…the grounds of police custody remand are that an in-depth investigation is needed to unearth the larger conspiracy behind this well-planned attack on the Parliament of India and the involvement of the other persons who have helped them in commission of the crime.”

According to the remand copy, the custody of the accused was needed to find the motive behind the attack and whether Jha and associates had links with any “other enemy country” as well as “terrorist organisations”. The remand copy further stated that police wished “to confront all the accused before each other to get a clear idea of the conspiracy as their disclosures are contradictory regarding the mobile phones and the place where they met.”

The prosecution also argued that the accused persons lived in separate states and needed to be taken to those states to recover the evidence.

It added that they also needed to locate Jha’s mobile phone and take him along to locate the hotel in which the accused stayed for four days in August. “We also need to know about the financial transactions and the funding behind the attack,” argued the prosecution.

Since Jha was not represented by a counsel, he was provided one by a court. Arguing against police custody, Advocate Umakant Kataria said 15 days were not required to interrogate Jha.

The other co-accused are currently in seven-day police custody of the Special Cell.
A senior Delhi Police officer said that the bank accounts of the accused persons are being scanned to trace the money trail and possible funding from any “questionable” organisation or firm. “Role of other associates whom they met or informed about the plan regarding the attack on the Parliament is also being probed,” the officer
added.

According to officers, Jha, who originally hailed from Bihar, worked as a teacher in Kolkata. He surrendered before the Kartavya Path Police Station on Thursday. Jha had uploaded two videos of the protest carried out by co-accused Neelam Azad and Amol Shinde outside the Parliament even as two other co-accused, Sagar and D Manoranjan, jumped into the Lok Sabha from the visitor’s gallery with colour spraying canisters.

Another person, Vicky alias Vikash Sharma, who allegedly gave shelter to the accused, was picked up from Gurugram but sent off after questioning. Officers said that Lalit used to teach students with his Instagram profile comprising photos of Bhagat Singh, Rabindranath Tagore, Fidel Castro, among others.

All the five accused have been booked under section 16 (punishment for terrorist act), 18 (punishment for conspiracy, etc.) and IPC section 120B (Criminal conspiracy), among other sections.