The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

A militant outfit Harkatul Mujahideen (HuM) and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) have been sending grenades which were used in an Awami League rally held on August 21, 2004, to India via Bangladesh, an unnamed intelligence official said.

A group's principal contact in Bangladesh is Harkat-ul-Jihad Islami (Huji), one of the organisations Dhaka has banned, but continues to operate.

A top intelligence official said the statements of Huji leaders, held with grenades, suggest that Pakistan-based militant organisations sent several consignments of grenades to Islamist militants in India via Bangladesh.

Some grenade consignments were, however, used in Dhaka on August 21, 2004, at the political rally addressed by former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who had a narrow escape.

Twenty-two Awami League workers and rally participants died and hundreds were injured at the rally held this day, four years ago.

The investigations, ordered by then government of Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, were "stunted" under orders of then Home Minister Altaf Hussain Choudhury and Minister of State for Home, Lutfozzaman Babar.

One of the key persons behind the grenade movement was Maulana Tajuddin, a brother of a deputy minister in the Zia government, Abdus Salam Pintu.

The Government changed five times to their Investigation officer (IO), on August 21, 2004 cases. The investigations had so far failed to detect the source of the grenades. Mufti Hannan, one of the masterminds of the grenade attacks that left about two-dozen AL leaders and activists dead and scores injured, is also charged in the cases. Meanwhile, Hannan also want to withdraw his confessional statement to the police.

Investigators say Maulana Tajuddin, who supplied the grenades for the August 21 attacks, "helped militants use Bangladesh as a transit point for smuggling grenades."

Although Interpol has issued a red alert for Tajuddin, he still remains untraced, said assistant superintendent of the Criminal Investigation Department Fazlul Kabir, also the investigation officer of the cases.

Investigators suspect that Tajuddin is holed up in the international militants groups.

Tajuddin also has close ties with detained Huji leader Mufti Abdul Hannan who studied with him at a Quwami madrassa in Lahore of Pakistan in the 80s.

Mohammad Javed Patwari chief of CID said, during investigations and also from information gathered from the arrested suspects indicate that Pintu's brother Maulana Tajuddin had supplied the grenades."