The firing took place in a densely populated area. However, no civilian was injured since the attack was targetted at the policemen on duty.
In a reminder of the 26/11 attack in Mumbai, three masked gunmen opened fire at a police picket at Shah Ali Banda in the old city of Hyderabad on Friday, killing one constable and injuring another.
The firing took place in a densely populated area. However, no civilian was injured since the attack was targetted at the policemen on duty.
According to eye witnesses, the three masked men riding on a two-wheeler approached the police picket at about 4.30pm and fired three rounds at the policemen present. U Ramesh, a constable belonging to the 11th battalion of Andhra Pradesh Special Police (APSP), was killed.
The policemen were changing shifts for lunch after finishing vigil during prayer time in the old city when the gunmen struck. According to the police, the gunmen targetted a lathi picket, implying the policemen were carrying no weapons barring lathis.
The Hyderabad city police have been on high alert for the last one month following an intelligence bureau (IB) alert indicating a 26/11-type terror attack in Hyderabad.
The alert also came in the backdrop of the completion of three years of bomb blast at Mecca Masjid in Hyderabad. The city police have drawn additional forces from the APSP to beef up security in the city and there has been an increase in frisking and policing on the roads of the city.
Though a formal investigation is yet to begin, the police officials suspect the role of one Vikaruddin, a former activist of the banned Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) in the incident. Vikaruddin has been on the radar of the city police for the past three years.
He is also an accused in two earlier firing incidents on police pickets.
In a similar incident on December 3, 2008, Vikaruddin and his accomplices left a letter at Falaknuma police picket indicating that they would continue to target policemen. This is believed to be an attempt to take revenge on policemen who had fired at Muslim youth after the Mecca Masjid blast in 2007.
Vikaruddin was also an activist of Daragah Jihad-e-Shahadat (DJS), a city-based right wing organisation which trains Muslim youths in self-defence. “We still don’t know if it is Vikaruddin who had fired at the constable. But, there is a similarity to what happened today and the earlier incidents,” Hyderabad police commissioner AK Khan said.
Interestingly, veterans in counter intelligence are surprised at the way the terrorists managed to keep a weapon with them and move around despite increased frisking on the roads.
“For the last one month, patrolling teams have been asking people to open everything they carry. No one knows how these three terrorists travelling on a two-wheeler managed to escape the police patrol with a weapon. It is a clear failure of the city police,” a retired counter intelligence expert said.
Sources said that the police teams have recovered a CD at the firing spot which might contain a message from the terror outfits explaining the reasons for the firing.
“Last time (in 2008), we recovered a letter written in Urdu which said that the policemen would continue to be targetted. We still don’t know what is there in the CD,” a source said.
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