Bhopal/Khandwa:Mother of one of the eight suspected operatives of the banned Students Islamic Federation of India (SIMI) said the police encounter in Acharapura village on Monday was “staged”.
Salma Bi, whose son Zakir Hussein was gunned down by the police nearly eight hours after he along with seven other SIMI suspects escaped from the high-security Bhopal central jail, said: “My son has been killed in a pre-planned encounter.”
“Neither did my son or his fellow jail inmates escape from the prison nor did they fire at the police before being gunned down in the so-called encounter in the Acharapura village.”
Hussein alias Vikki Don alias Vinay Kumar was among the seven men involved in the Khandwa jail break in October 2013. He was arrested from Rourkela in February and sent to Bhopal jail in March.
“When I met Zakir the last time at the Bhopal central jail on Eid-ul-Juha in September, he had told me that he was not safe and anything could be done to him, both inside the jail or outside the jail by the police,” Salma told HT from her home town in Khandwa.
“Zakir had asked me to meet him at short intervals for his safety, which I couldn’t do and the result is for all to see.”
The middle-aged woman, who came to know about the encounter from the television channels, accused the local police of assaulting her when they came to inquire about Zakir after he escaped and keeping the news of his death from her.
“Eight to 10 cops of the Khandwa district police came to our house after the alleged jail escape on Monday and asked me about my son and his friends. When I asked why they were troubling us again and again, one of the cops slapped me four times and even pushed away my visually challenged sister-in-law Rehana Bi,” she said.
She asked if it could be just a coincidence that the local cops had visited their house a fortnight ago and had asked them not to leave Khandwa at any cost.
Zakir, who is wanted in several bank robberies and loot cases, was the eldest of the four children of Salma and her Badru Hussain, who owns a construction material shop in Aman Nagar-Ganesh Talai locality in Khandwa.
Salma expressed fear that the police might also kill Zakir’s younger brother Altaf, lodged at the Bhopal central jail in other terror-related cases for last six years. “The cops have murdered one of my sons in pre-planned manner and might do the same with my second son,” she said.
Two video clips purportedly showing policemen shooting at the fugitives has raised doubts about the authenticity of the encounter. The police said on Monday the veracity of the clips that surfaced on news channels was yet to be ascertained.
“We acted on intelligence and located the inmates. They fired on us and all eight were killed in crossfire,” Yogesh Chaudhury, the Bhopal inspector general of police, told reporters, adding that three cops were injured in the encounter.
Inspector general of the anti-terror squad who led the operation, Sanjeev Shami, however, said the fugitives were unarmed and no cop was injured.
Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan described the lapses that led to the jailbreak as “criminal negligence” and said the incident will be probed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA). The government also suspended five jail department officials.
Bhopal SIMI encounter seems fake, SC should step in, says Opposition
NEW DELHI: Suggesting that the elimination of eight SIMI activists by the police at the same place on the outskirts of Bhopal appeared to be faked, the Congress party on Tuesday urged the Supreme Court to assign a retired judge to probe the matter.
Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge told ANI, “I saw the photographs on television and they do bring suspicion. They make us think that was that encounter fake? Because it seems quite difficult to imagine that eight people at a time were killed by the police at the same place together. This matter should be investigated and the Supreme Court should assign this matter to a retired Supreme Court judge to probe the matter and clear all doubts.”
Former Madhya Pradesh chief minister and Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh said the repeated instance of prisoners escaping from jails across the country suggested a larger 'conspiracy'.
"Why do only Muslims break out of jail and not Hindus", said the congress leader.
"It is a serious issue. First SIMI activists fled the Khandwa Jail. Now, they have fled from the Bhopal jail. I have been reiterating that RSS activists and other similar organisations are behind the anti-Muslim riots in the country. It should be probed whether there is someone behind this or not," he said earlier.
Accusing the MP government of using police for fulfilling the RSS agenda, BSP supremo Mayawati today demanded a judicial probe into the encounter of eight prisoners associated with banned organisation SIMI.
She also charged that police is misused for political and communal motives in BJP-ruled states.
Defending its action to open fire on the eight SIMI terrorists who broke out of Bhopal Central Jail on Monday morning, Madhya Pradesh Police asserted that the escapees were neutralised in ‘retaliatory’ fire, adding that the suspects have been continuously perpetrating serious offences and had also killed police constables in 2008 and 2011.
Bhopal’s Inspector General of Police Yogesh Choudhary said all eight SIMI terrorists were killed in cross-firing and had a track record of being involved in serious crimes before.
“We garnered all possible resources and launched search and patrol parties after we got intelligence that around 7-8 people were seen by locals. It was difficult to locate them as the unequal terrain was a disadvantage, but soon our team was fired upon when we challenged the suspects,” he said.
The eight terrorists of the banned SIMI group escaped from the Bhopal Central Jail after killing a guard. They were gunned down in an encounter by the state police yesterday.
Chaudhary claimed they had weapons and were killed as they were trying to flee.
“They were killed in cross firing. It was a big challenge and the team accepted it properly,” he said.
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