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Pune Terror Trail
Nearby hotel's CCTV footage may hold clues
Shiv Kumar writes from Pune

Investigators probing Saturday night’s explosion in the posh Koregaon Park area here are searching for clues from the close circuit television camera of Hotel O near the ill-fated German Bakery.

Police sources confirmed that security cameras at the posh hotel captured footage of two persons handling rucksacks similar to the one that contained the explosives. While one of the persons was seen speaking into a mobile phone, the other was seen handling the bag.

However, the footage is grainy and further forensic analysis was required before efforts were made to trace the two individuals, police said. Eyewitnesses have told the police that they saw two persons rush out of German Bakery in an autorickshaw shortly before the blast.

Investigators are also waiting to question a Nepali waiter, Paras Rimal, who works at the bakery. He is currently undergoing treatment at the Sassoon Hospital. The police say Rimal may have seen the persons who placed the rucksack containing the explosives under a table. Upon noticing the rucksack, Rimal tried to get its owner to remove it but he was called away by a customer.

Another waiter who tried to remove the rucksack died in the explosion along with those seated at the table. In all nine persons died and 60 have been injured in the incident.

With the Maharashtra home ministry revealed that Rimal may have seen and spoken to the suspected bombers, authorities are under pressure to protect him. Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly Eknath Khadse told reporters that maximum security should be given to the witness so that the alleged bombers could be nabbed. Khadse likened the waiter to taxi driver Shivnarain Pandey, who identified bombers who set off explosives in his taxi near the Gateway of India in 2003.

Having played a major role in nabbing the bombers, Pandey has been given a different identity and rehabilitated somewhere in the country.

Meanwhile, Investigators confirmed on Monday that RDX was used in the bomb that went off at German Bakery. However, the police has not confirmed the presence of other explosives like ammonium nitrate so far. Possibilities of the device having been activated by a mobile phone-based remote control were also being investigated.

Can't rule out foreign hand: Pillai

New Delhi, February 15
The government today said it cannot rule out possibility of involvement of foreign hand in the Pune blast, including a David Headley link, even as it disclosed that an ISI-sponsored 'Karachi Project' was on to doctrinate Indian youth into terror. India is planning to seek access to Headley, a US national of Pakistani origin now in American custody, by even moving the US court. Home Secretary Gopal K Pillai said there is definitely a Headley link (to Pune blast) since it was very close to Osho Ashram that he had visited. It was difficult to believe there was no link with the Headley videos. “We cannot rule out or rule in the possibility of the involvement of foreign hands in Pune blast," Pillai told reporters adding as to who did it and how they did it will take some time. — PTI

IM militant Shahzad to be quizzed

Pune, February 15
As the link of militant outfit Indian Mujahideen (IM) with the Pune attack is being increasingly suspected, investigators were today set to quiz one of its key men, Shahzad, over the presence of the terror group’s sleeper cells in Maharashtra, especially in this city. A team of Maharashtra anti-terrorism squad (ATS), probing the Pune blast, would go to Delhi to question suspected IM terrorist Shahzad, arrested in connection with 2008 serial blasts in the National Capital, sources said. Shahzad, 21, had much information about the sleeper cells of the terror outfit active in Maharashtra and particularly in Pune, they said. A list of suspects, who could have been directly or indirectly involved in the blast, had been prepared, they said. Also, the Centre is, in a bid to crack the case quickly, mulling a reward of Rs 1 crore to anyone who gives clues about terrorists who planted the bomb. — PTI