The CCTV footage of robbery at a State Bank of India branch in Telangana in February.
After the National Investigation Agency recovered Rs 44,000 from Razia Bibi, widow of the terror suspect in the October 2 Burdwan blast in West Bengal, the agency is now investigating where the money came from.
The trail has led the National Investigation Agency or NIA to Choppadandi town in Karimnagar district of Telangana where a State Bank of India branch was robbed in February. The robbers had fled with 46 lakh rupees.
Now, some of the notes recovered from Burdwan are being examined to see if they came from the Choppadandi bank.
The Choppadandi incident was being probed as a regular criminal case of dacoity by the Karimnagar district police, but it is only after the CCTV was sent to the NIA for enhancement that it dawned that the robbery was part of a complex web of terror - the investigation agency identified the robbers as the same terror suspects who had escaped from Khandwa jail.
It may be a painstaking and time-consuming process with forensic experts involved, but sources in the NIA have confirmed that the Burdwan-Telangana link is being investigated. They also confirmed that the four bank robbers were in fact activists of the banned terror group, Students Islamic Movement of India or SIMI.
Meanwhile, the blast in West Bengal's Burdwan district has also raised a question in intelligence circles - on whether it was a joint venture between Bangladeshi and Indian terror outfits. Shakil Ahmed aka Shakil Gazi, the man who died in the Burdwan blast on October 2, is believed to be a Bangladeshi.