Burdwan Blast Case: NIA Announces Cash Reward for 12 Absconding Suspects

Kolkata: The National Investigation Agency has announced cash awards for 12 absconding suspects in the Burdwan blast case. Of the 12, four of the wanted persons are believed to be from Bangladesh, one from Assam and the rest from West Bengal. All of them are believed to have links with the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh or JMB.

The NIA has released photographs of nine of the wanted persons but has no photograph of three of the four suspected Bangladeshi nationals involved.

Rs 10 lakh are being offered for five of those wanted:

• Sajid, 40, suspected Bangladeshi, is believed to be the chief of the Burdwan module. He was staying near the Lalgola madrasa in Bengal's Murshidabad district.
• Nasirullah, also known as Suhail, is believed to be a bomb-making expert who lost his right hand in an accidental improvised explosive device or IED blast. A suspected Bangladeshi, he was living at Beldanga in Murshidabad district, where the terror suspect Shakeel Ahmed, killed in the 2nd October blast, lived for some years.
• Kausar, a suspected Bangladeshi, was one of the last people to meet Shakeel Ahmed met before Ahmed died in the accidental bomb blast. Kausar was living in Burdwan and is believed to have carried IEDs into Bangladesh. The police has released a sketch of him.
• Talha Sheikh, 28, and a suspected Bangladeshi, had two address in Bengal - One in Nadia district, another in Birbhum's Kirnahar, which is President Pranab Mukherjee's native place. He is believed to have trained jihadi recruits in the unrecognized madrasas of Shimula and Lalgola.
• Maulana Yusuf Shiekh, 32, is the only Indian national for whom the NIA has offered a Rs 10 lakh award. He was a resident of Burdwan district and had allegedly set up the madrasa at Shimulia where jihadi training was allegedly imparted.

The others with lesser sums on their heads are:

• Abu Kalam, believed to have links with Shakeel Ahmed.
• Amjad Ali Sheikh, a resident of Kirhanar, the President's native place.
• Burhan Sheikh, who apparently gave land to set up the madrasa at Shimulia.
• Rejaul Karim, from whose house in Burdwan the NIA found 39 IEDs.
• Habibur Rahman Sheikh, who shared a house with Kausar.
• Jahirul Sheikh and Shahnur Alom - also called "doctor" - who is from Barpeta district of Assam.