Yasin Bhatkal, alleged terror mastermind, in police custody
The critical mistake of sending 1000 dollars home before Eid proved to be the undoing of alleged terror mastermind Yasin Bhatkal, who was arrested on Wednesday night in north Bihar, near the border with Nepal.
For six months, intelligence agencies had kept a close watch on the Indian Mujahideen (IM) co-founder's wife and his alleged associates in Delhi, through an informer close to the family. They had also tapped phone calls to the family.
Yasin, 30, reportedly told his interrogators that his phone calls to his wife gave him away.
Sources say Yasin called his wife twice just before Eid on August 9. After the calls, he sent a tranche of money to her through the hawala route, which was traced to Pokhara in Nepal.
But the agencies reportedly had the first clear lead on his whereabouts five months ago, when their informer revealed that Yasin had sent some money and clothes to his wife.
Almost simultaneously, Intelligence Bureau (IB)'s source in Bihar revealed that Yasin and his IM associates had been spotted in a remote village in the west of Nepal, in March.
Informers even recced the house in Nepal where Yasin had been staying since 2011. Locals there believed that he was a Unani doctor - one who specialises in Islamic traditional remedies - a cover he had allegedly used during terror activities in India.
Fellow Indian Mujahideen member Asadullah or Haddi, who was also arrested with Yasin, had joined him in February.
But even after identifying Yasin, intelligence agencies waited until their big moment arrived on Wednesday.
"The moment Yasin and Asaddullah moved to cross over into India from the Raxual border on Wednesday, a team of the Intelligence Bureau, National Investigation Agency and the Bihar police caught them," said a source.