Delhi: Wound in youth's left hand led to JeM arrests

The run up to the events leading to the arrest of Sajid Abbasi an alleged Jaish-e-Mohammad mastermind, was an accident that took place in the ground floor room of his yellow house, located in lane 3 of Charbagh area in Delhi’s congested North East. On the night of May 2, Monday, the 19-year-old is believed to have been assembling an IED with home-made material with his accomplices, that exploded injuring his left hand, the police have claimed.

Having learnt the recipe of how to make explosives at home through an online manual, Sajid is purported to be preparing an improvised explosive device using batteries, pipes and black residue to carry out explosions in shopping malls and public places in the capital to further JeM’s ideology of jihad. He was arrested on late Tuesday evening. The wounds on the left palm of Sajid – with red and black burn scars – is a clinching evidence for the Delhi Special cell to connect his association by guilt with an impending terror plot.

For his sister Mehzabeen though the police claims labelling Sajid as a terrorist is a false interpretation of a quarrel between the brother and a sister gone wrong. The youngest of the six siblings, the girl agrees that Sajid had an accident on Monday night, but in her version the burn marks on his hand resulted after she threw boiling milk on him. Sajid is extremely naughty and jovial and we usually have small fights and quarrels between us, Mehzabeen, 17 years old, says narrating the incident. “On Monday, he returned from the mosque and asked for milk to drink. When he saw me, the dupatta on my head had slipped and this angered him. He hit me on the head and in return I threw the boiling milk on him.’’

“The police think that the injuries on his palm are due to a bomb explosion. It's not, I am responsible for those marks. I feel guilty to have fought with my brother and for throwing the boiling milk on his hand."

Sajid and Mehzabeen being the youngest and unmarried stay in the house with their mother, while the rest of the siblings stay in the nearby localities. The family strongly refuted the claims that Sajid was storing and assembling IEDs in his tailoring unit -- a job that --- earns him between Rs 7,000 and Rs 12,000. He has been handling the tailoring unit for the last four years to sustain the family following his father’s demise six years ago.

“Nothing gets hidden in this locality. Our houses are so close to each other that the neighbours can peep and extend their ears to drop in on conversations. How can then my son be making bomb here? All the doors of his tailoring unit are always open,’’ asks Aamna, Sajid’s mother.

Calling Sajid as the main leader of JeM's new module spanned across Delhi and UP, Special Cell Commissioner Arvind Deep said that he is a self- radicalised individual who would listen to speeches of JeM leader Maulana Masood Azhar and download jihadi literature online. Sajid, the family said would perform namaaz five times and visit the local mosque everyday. “That’s all he used to do, tailoring at home and namaaz in the mosque. He would barely leave the house otherwise,’’ Mehzabeen says. While the young girl would like to read newspaper and watch news, the small pleasures were taken off from her after Sajid broke the only television two years ago. “Sajid would say it's not good to watch television and the newspapers don’t print real news. So we had no news on what’s happening around us.’’

A staunch believer in Shariah, Sajid would insist his sisters and mother dress Islamically and follow a pious way of life. Showing even a little skin on the arms would lead to a barrage of taunts from him, his older sister recalls. “He would say your heads should be nailed, so the dupatta will not fall. Be scared of Allah.’’

In the ground floor tailoring unit, where Sajid would work to make men’s innerwear, the walls are plastered with small pamphlets and posters. The one that stands out is, 'Kafir Kaun'--- who is an infidel?' on the left side of the wall. The room has been sealed by the police after confiscating a live IED, a damaged IED and some raw material including 250gm of black residue.