Cops probe terror angle in Coimbatore blast after bomb material found at deceased's home, victim was under NIA scanner

The Tamil Nadu Police are investigating possible terror plot angle into the death of a 25-year-old man in a gas cylinder blast in Coimbatore after having recovered huge quantities of explosives from his house. 

Jemisha Mubeen, who died in the blast near a temple in Coimbatore on Sunday, was earlier questioned by the National Investigation Agency in 2019 for his ties to a radical network related to Zahran Hashim, the mastermind of the Easter Sunday blasts in Sri Lanka.

Hours after the incident occurred, state police chief C Sylendra Babu said there has been "good progress" in the probe and stated that the possibility of a NIA probe into the matter will be known after the conclusion of the investigation.

Mubeen had been earlier enquired by the NIA but there has been no case against him nor has there been any "adverse notice," the top official said.

Mubeen was charred to death when a gas cylinder in a car in which he was travelling exploded in a communally sensitive area in the city this morning, prompting the state's top cop to rush here and take stock of the situation.  

The police conducted a seach at Mubeen’s house and recovered some low intensive explosives -- potassium nitrate, aluminium powder, charcoal, sulphur -- used in making country bombs.

These seemed to be meant for some "future" plans, he said but added only a thorough probe will reveal what that could be, Babu said.

Meanwhile, a CCTV footage of the incident has surfaced, which shows the victim Jameza Mubin and a few others carrying a mysterious object from his house in Ukkadam few hours before the blast.

There are no cases against the deceased but those having link with him over the past few years have been brought under the probe ambit, Babu added.

Asked if the NIA had earlier held "searches" against Mubeen, the top official replied in the affirmative. "Some enquiry happened.. (there was) no adverse notice (against Mubeen)," he said.

Security has already been beefed up across the state ahead of the Deepavali festival and extra vigil will be mounted in Coimbatore, he said.

The deceased was an engineering graduate, he said. "Chances are less" was his response to a question on the possibility of a suicide attack mission involving the deceased person.

He lauded the probe teams for making rapid progress in the case within 12 hours of the incident and said each team was entrusted with a particular task in connection with the case.

The incident took place near the Kottai Easwaran temple and all the shops in the vicinity were closed and a large number of police personnel have been deployed in the area. Being a communally sensitive area, a tense situation prevailed in the Ukkadam locality where the explosion happened in the early hours of Sunday.

There were two cylinders and one of them exploded, the police chief had said earlier in the day.