Kerala points north, makes terror arrest: There146;s a Valley link

Almost a fortnight after a suspected militant from Kerala was killed by security agencies in North Kashmir...

Almost a fortnight after a suspected militant from Kerala was killed by security agencies in North Kashmir, the state police today arrested Abdul Jaleel, 38, a resident of Kannur. Jaleel, an activist of Kerala-based right wing Muslim outfit National Development Front NDF, is alleged to have had close links with the suspected militant.

According to state intelligence sources, Jaleel, had been under the police radar for some time now following law and order issues in his locality of Edakkadu in Kannur. A painter by profession, he was allegedly active in propagating fundamentalism. He had also taken part in a recent rally organised by the NDF in Kannur to protest against the Indo-US nuclear deal.

While tracking his movements, police reportedly stumbled upon several mobile phone calls that Jaleel had received from Kashmir till October 5, two days before the encounter in Kupwara in which the suspected militant from Kerala was killed. On the same day itself, he discarded the SIM card which he had been using for the last one year.

Asked why he had abandoned the mobile number, Jaleel reportedly told the police that he had been getting 8220;pestering calls8221;. 8220;Our probe debunked his claim. After the calls from J038;K, he was in a hurry to destroy evidence,8221; said an officer.

According to the police, the calls from Kashmir were made from the SIM card recovered from the militant killed in the encounter on October 7. The Kashmir police had recovered two ID cards bearing Kerala addresses and writings in Malayalam from the dead man.

There had been several rounds of to-and-fro communication between Jaleel and his connections in Kashmir. Jaleel, an upper primary school dropout, is not very familiar with languages other than Malayalam. 8220;As he knows only Malayalam, we could conclude that his Kashmir connection also hailed from Kerala. On this ground and other circumstantial evidence, we could also say they have been operating with extremists in Kashmir,8221; sources said.

Jaleel8217;s arrest is a major breakthrough for the Kerala Police, who now hope to crack the suspected terror network operating in the state. After the serial blasts in Ahmedabad in July this year, the Gujarat Police had revealed that the arrested SIMI activists had undergone arms training camp at Vagamon hill station in Kottayam.