Cellphone provides lead in Indian mosque blast
INDIA: A shopkeeper has provided a photograph of the man who
allegedly bought the subscriber data card that was in a phone found at
the site of deadly mosque blast in southern India, police said.
The phone was part of the trigger mechanism in one of two explosive
devices that police defused after a bomb killed nine people at the
17th-century Mecca Mosque in the city of Hyderabad as thousands offered
prayers there Friday.
Officials on Saturday revised the death toll in the blast from 11 to
nine. Five people were also killed after the blast in protests when
police opened fire to subdue rioters angered by the attack staged on the
Muslim holy day.
The bombing and subsequent clashes between protesters and police in
the city, an emerging tech hub and the capital of Andhra Pradesh state,
left almost 60 injured.
Information from the slightly damaged but still verifiable subscriber
identity module (SIM) card led police Sunday to a cellular phone shop in
West Bengal state in eastern India.
Mohammad Shahid, who runs the shop in an eastern district of the
state but lives across the border in neighbouring Jharkhand, confirmed
selling the card in June and provided a photograph of the alleged
purchaser, police said.
“The buyer had submitted photocopies of a driving license issued in
the name of Babulal Yadav. We are in the process of verifying the
document,” said Jharkhand police officer Kanklata Lakra.
Kolkata, tuesday, AFP. |