The National Investigation Agency on Tuesday confirmed the arrest of terror suspect Mohammed Jahidul Islam picked up from Ramanagara Town, near Bengaluru on Monday.
According to an NIA release, the special NIA court in Bengaluru has granted five days transit remand for the 38-year-old Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh member, who has multiple aliases including Kausar and Munna, and has also previously been known to go by Mizan and Boma Miyan.
It further said that the suspect would be produced in the special NIA court in Patna in the coming days.
“The 36-year-old was arrested from his house in Ramanagara. His house was also searched and some electronic devices besides traces of explosives have been recovered during the search. He is the top leader of JMB in India and is wanted in Burdwan blast case and in many other cases in Bangladesh also,” the release stated.
Sources in the NIA on Monday had said that he had escaped from the clutches of Bangladeshi police by attacking them while in custody.
According to the same release, he is cited as being the mastermind in the 2013 Bodh Gaya serial blast case in which more than seven people were injured in explosions at the UNESCO World Heritage sites.
In June, a special NIA court in Patna had sentenced five convicts in the case to life imprisonment while the sixth convict a juvenile was sent to three years of confinement in a remand home. Two others got 7 and 14 years of imprisonment in the same case.
The NIA said that it was on his direction that Mustafizur Rehaman alias Shahin had arranged and assembled all explosives in the incident.
Incidentally, his arrest coincided with the arrest of two other suspects in the Bodh Gaya blast case from Kerala’s Malappuram district.
The two suspects—Abdul Karim from Murshidabad and Mustafizur Rehman both natives of West Bengal were allegedly planting IEDs.
Earlier on Monday, soon after his detention by a joint team of investigation agencies there was speculation that he was a suspected Maoist. However, later it was confirmed that he was a JMB member and is allegedly part of previous terror attacks.