Alleged LeT operatives urge home minister for NIA probe

NEW DELHI: Two alleged Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) operatives, arrested recently, wrote to the Union home minister on Thursday, urging him to transfer the case to the NIA for “fair” investigation.
In a letter sent to Sushilkumar Shinde, advocate M S Khan—counsel of the accused Mohd Rashid and Mohd Shahid- said the case requires “thorough and fair investigation”, as there were loopholes in the version of special cell of Delhi Police which is probing the case.
In the letter, the counsel referred to a speech given by Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi in Indore where he had said that an intelligence official had told him about the infiltration of ISI in relief camps in Muzaffarnagar for recruitment of youngsters.
In the communication, the lawyer recalled that Gandhi had stated that an IB officer had contacted those youngsters while the special cell claimed they received inputs about Rashid and Shahid- who were arrested in Haryana- from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in November-end last year.
“Special cell of Delhi Police claims to have arrested two persons, namely Shahid and Rashid, from Mewat region on December 7 and December 16, 2013 on the basis of alleged secret inputs received from CIA in the end of November. Now those two accused are being projected in such a manner so as to prove Rahul’s speech true,” he said in the letter.
Rashid is in police custody till Friday and will be produced before the trial court where Khan is likely to apprise additional sessions judge Daya Prakash about the letter. Shahid is currently in judicial custody.
“This matter requires thorough and fair investigation as these two persons have been made scapegoats,” Khan’s letter said. He said NIA was set up for taking up probe of matters having national ramifications. “Under NIA Act, 2008, the Central Government is vested with the power to direct investigation of scheduled offences by NIA and in the fact and circumstances, it is a fit case for exercising such powers by the government...,” the letter said.