Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU/NEW DELHI, Dec 2: Telephonic conversations recorded in a CD seized from alleged ISI operative Kafaitullah Khan’s possession have disclosed names of four persons who are suspected to be active sources for the espionage racket he headed in Rajouri district of Jammu region.
While three of the suspects are located in Rajouri district, the fourth is at West Bengal’s Siliguri city, official sources said.
“Of the three suspects located at Rajouri, one is a serving Army personnel, another retired this year from the armed force, who is also suspected to be a relative of Khan, and the other is a civilian,” said the official, adding that the suspect at Siliguri is also a serving Army personnel.
One of the retired BSF official under radar has retired as Sub Inspector.
The names of the two Rajouri-based sources — the serving and the retired army personnel — had also appeared in the frequently called list extracted from Khan’s mobile phone records, the official said.
While a 14-member team of the Inter-State Cell of Delhi Police’s Crime Branch, led by two Inspectors (to head each sub-team), has reached Rajouri, another eight-member team led by an Inspector has left for Siliguri today, said the official.
The suspects and Khan indulged in frequent conversations, allegedly discussing about secret documents addressing them by code-name ‘Samaan’, said the official.
However, the police are still clueless regarding the intelligence agency’s source at the office of the Pakistan High Commission here, the official added.
On Thursday, Delhi Police intercepted Kafaitullah Khan from New Delhi railway station while he was heading to Bhopal to join a religious conversation.
After interrogating him, the police took him to Rajouri, from where they arrested serving BSF personnel Abdul Rasheed on Sunday, said police.
While Khan is a Pakistan Intelligence Operative who was allegedly running an espionage racket here backed by the ISI, Rasheed was one of his sources who is believed to have double-crossed him, said police.
The police recovered several secret documents — including maps disclosing troop locations and movements — from their possession. The duo have been booked under Official Secrets Act, police added.
PTI adds from Lucknow:
Uttar Pradesh Police today said the money in the account of suspected ISI agent Mohammad Eizaz, who was arrested from Meerut on November 27, was deposited from Srinagar and Gulf countries.
“After going through Mohammad Eizaz alias Mohammad Kalam’s account it was found that Rs 5.78 lakh was deposited in his account from Srinagar and gulf countries,” IG, Special Task Force Sujit Pandey told reporters here.
Eizaz, a resident of Islamabad in Pakistan, was arrested by a STF team from Meerut Cannt area. He is in police remand till December 6.
Documents related to Indian Army, Pakistani identity proof, fake voter identity of West Bengal, fake Aadhar card in address of Bareily district, Delhi Metro card, laptop, pen drives were recovered from his possession, he said.
The STF and other intelligence agencies are trying to elicit more information from the agent, on whose tip-off three more Pakistani national were arrested in Kolkata.
During interrogation, the agent revealed that in 2012 he came in contact with ISI, which trained him to work in India, where he had to send information of Army from west UP and Uttrakahand, Pandey said.
In India, he started photography and videography to collect sensitive information and procured Aadhar card from Bareilly with the help of a local, he said.
“Eizaz was paid Rs 5.8 lakh till now and his family was paid Rs 50,000 per month in Pakistan,” he said.
Meanwhile, in Kolkata, the Special Task Force of the Kolkata Police today arrested a passport agent here for his alleged links with Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence, just three days after it busted a module of the Pakistani spy agency in the city.
It was Sheikh Badal, the 59-year-old passport agent held today, who had helped arrested suspected ISI-spy Mohammad Ejaz alias Mohammad Kalam in Uttar Pradesh in managing a fake voter identity card, a senior officer of the STF said today.
Badal’s name surfaced during the grilling sessions of Mohammed Jahangir, arrested last Sunday along with Irshad Ansari, his son Asfaq Ansari, he said.
“Badal and Jahangir have been friends for quite a long time. Jahangir was into tailoring before he started working as agent at the Regional Passport Officer here and it was there he met Badal… The two became close friends,” the IPS officer said.
Badal, a resident of the Karaya area in south-east part of the city, according to the officer, has a complicated family history.
“It’s only a few hours that we have arrested him. But going by the preliminary questioning we have found that Badal was born in India, but moved to Bangladesh where he got married and had a son who died in a political violence when he was 15 years old. After that Badal returned to India and again got married to a local lady,” the officer said.
But he has been a frequent visitor to Dhaka, the purpose was still unknown, he said adding that several “incriminating documents” were seized from him.
Badal was arrested from in front of the Regional Passport office on Brabourne Road in the central business district of the city at around 2.30 PM today.
He has been booked under the Indian Penal Code sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 121 (waging or attempting to wage war or abetting waging of war against the Government of India), 121A (conspiracy to commit offences punishable by section 121), 489B (using as genuine forged or counterfeit currency notes or bank notes) and 489C (possession of forged or counterfeit currency-notes or bank-notes).
Meanwhile, intense grilling of Akhtar Khan and Jaffar Khan, the brother duo arrested for their alleged links with the ISI, revealed that both had been travelling to Pakistan as well as Bangladesh on fake documents including passports, the STF officer said.
“Jaffar had applied for passport in 1989 but his application was cancelled, but he went to Pakistan in 1990. He again applied for the same in 2012 and did not mention that his application was cancelled earlier because of which he was fined by the passport authorities,” the officer said.
In fact, Akhtar too applied for a passport claiming that his earlier passport was misplaced.
“But the passport number he provided with his application belonged to someone else as per the records of the passport office… So there are lots of complications behind their activities. We are probing everything,” the IPS officer said.
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