Representational Image. (IANS Photo)
New Delhi/Srinagar, September 24 (IANS): In a major breakthrough, the Jammu and Kashmir Police have arrested one person accused of providing logistical support to the terrorists involved in the April 22 Pahalgam attack. The arrested individual has been identified as Mohammad Yousuf Katari.
The arrest took place following a forensic analysis of weapons and equipment that were recovered during Operation Mahadev that was carried out in July this year.
During the operation, the security forces tracked down and neutralised three terrorists who killed 26 people in Pahalgam.
Katari is a key operative of the Lashkar-e-Taiba’s proxy The Resistance Front. He is a native of Kulgam district. He was called in for questioning two days back, following which he was arrested.
The probe found that he had been providing logistic support to the terrorist who was killed in the Dachigam forest during Operative Mahadev.
The Srinagar Police said that they have arrested an over ground worker (OWG) from south Kashmir identified as Mohammad Yousuf Katari.
He had a role in providing logistic support to the terrorists who were killed in Operation Mahadev. He has been sent to 14 days police custody.
Officials said that he had a contractual job and also taught local children. He came in contact with terrorists a few months back and began supporting their movements.
He is said to have helped the terrorists to navigate through Kulgpm’s forest area months before the Pahalgam attack that took place on April 22 this year.
The National Investigation Agency which is also investigating this case had in June arrested two men for allegedly harbouring the terrorists who had carried out the attack.
Parvaiz Ahmad Jothar from Batkote and Bashir Ahmad Jothar of Hill Park, Pahalgam, had disclosed the identities of the three terrorists who were involved in the attack.
They are said to have provided food and shelter to the terrorists. The NIA had also arrested a resident of Handwara and interrogated him in connection with the funding that went into this attack.
The agency also is scrutinising 450 phone numbers, including of those involved in 80 cases that are being investigated by the agency since 2011.
The agency learnt that one Yasir Hayat was in touch with a suspected Malaysian based handler Sajad Ahmed Mir and two others from Pakistan.
Hayat was being instructed by Mir to give funds to the tune of Rs 2 lakh to Shafat Wani. During his trip to Malaysia, Hayat was in touch with two Pakistanis.
In all, Wani is said to have received a sum of Rs 9 lakh which was used to fund terror activities.
The NIA in a statement said that it had uncovered a foreign trail of funds, which is under scrutiny. The NIA probe exposes a complex network of foreign funding that was linked to accounts in Malaysia.
The money was being routed in for The Resistance Front which carried out the attack. The Indian Intelligence Agencies and the Jammu and Kashmir Police along with the NIA are trying to build a detailed dossier on the outfit.
This would comprise the funding details, radicalisation, training and recruitment into the terror outfit. The Resistance Front is just a proxy of the Lashkar-e-Taiba. It was created by the ISI to suggest that the Kashmir battle was being fought by locals.
The ISI also wanted a deniability for Pakistan and the Lashkar-e-Taiba each time The Resistance Front undertook an attack on Indian soil.
The dossier that is being prepared by the agencies is also important in the context of nailing the terror funding route which links Pakistan to it. India proposes to corner Pakistan at the Financial Action Task Force and hopes that the country will go back into the Grey List, like it had a few years back.
