Thiruvananthapuram: Sixteen days after 27-year-old Delhi youth, Shahrukh Saifi, set ablaze passengers on a train bound for Kannur, on Monday the head of the special investigation team of the Kerala Police said the youth was “a highly radicalised personality”.
Speaking to the media on Monday, SIT head M.R. Ajithkumar said that each and every detail of what he did right from the time he boarded the train from Delhi, reached here and till he got arrested from Ratnagiri has been found out.
“We have got all the details of what he did and he has been identified as a person who is highly radicalised. He has been watching such videos. At the moment it’s early to say if he has got help from other quarters,” said Ajithkumar.
“We have found out that he came with the motive to do what he did. You can also find out for yourself about the area from where he hails. Our probe has been done with the support of other national agencies and other state agencies. UAPA charges have also been levied on the accused,” added Ajithkumar.
The probe team has found out that he was travelling alone from Delhi and though he took a ticket to Kozhikode, he got down at Shornur on April 2nd morning.
Then till he boarded the train to Kannur on Sunday late evening. He spent time at Shornur from where he purchased petrol from a fuel filling station, which has also been identified, after the auto driver who took Saifi confirmed this with the probe team.
After the train that he boarded from Shornur left Kozhikode, Saifi arrived at the D 1 compartment and doused passengers with petrol and set them on fire.
While three passengers in fright jumped out of the moving train, and were later reported dead on the impact of the fall, nine others also suffered burn injuries.
Saifi then reached Kannur on the same train and after a few hours boarded another train and reached Ratnagiri, from where he was arrested by a team of the Anti-Terror Squad of Maharashtra Police based on a tip off from Central agencies on April 5. The next day he was brought to Kozhikode in kKerala and after a day in the hospital, he has been in the custody of the Kerala Police probe team ever since.
In the remand report, the police have held Saifi responsible for the death of the three including a girl, though he has said that he was not responsible for it.
Now the question is will the NIA which is closely monitoring the ongoing probe take over.
–IANS
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