October 24, 2010
Top RSS leader charged for involvement in the Ajmer blasts of 2007
Mail Today, 24 October 2010
cover story
CHARGESHEET NAILS TOP RSS LEADER'S LIE
By Sudhanshu Mishra in Jaipur
AJMER DARGAH BLAST 2007
Indresh chaired terror group meet that plotted blast
Assigned roles to RSS masterminds of attack that killed 3
TOP RASHTRIYA Swayamsevak Sangh ( RSS) leader Indresh Kumar’s lie has been nailed. A chargesheet filed by the Rajasthan Anti- Terrorism Squad in the October 2007 Ajmer Dargah blast case names several RSS functionaries, including Indresh, who is named as a person who addressed the conspirators.
Indresh had consistently denied his involvement in the blast. When M AIL T ODAY highlighted on July 15 this year that the Ajmer, Malegaon and Mecca Masjid terror probe had reached Indresh’s door, hundreds of activists attacked the offices of MAIL TODAY and the TV Today network, vandalising property. The 806-page chargesheet filed on Friday alleges that the conspiracy to explode bombs in Ajmer as well as several other Indian cities was hatched in the Gujarati Samaj Guest House in Jaipur in October 2005. It includes 213 support documents and a list of 133 witnesses. The three prime conspirators named are Devendra Gupta, Lokesh Sharma and Chandra Shekhar Leve. The chargesheet was issued by additional SP of the Rajasthan ATS Satyendra Singh Ranawat.
Leve was produced in the court of Ajmer’s acting chief judicial magistrate Jagendra Kumar Agrawal. The Rajasthan ATS also submitted jail warrants for Gupta and Sharma, currently lodged in a Hyderabad jail in connection with the Mecca Masjid blasts.
Two other accused Sandeep Dange and Ramji Kalsangre, both residents of Indore in Madhya Pradesh, are absconding. They are also accused in the Mecca Masjid case. According to the ATS, no organisation was involved in the terror act but some of their members formed a group of terrorists to execute the crime.” The chargesheet provides some sensational details. According to the document, a secret meeting was held in Room 26 of the Gujarati Samaj Guest House on October 31, 2005.
The seven persons who attended the meeting were Indresh Kumar, Pragya Thakur (accused in the Malegaon blasts), Sunil Joshi (an RSS pracharak who was shot dead in December 2007), Ramchandra alias Ramji Kalsangre, Devendra Gupta, Lokesh Sharma and Sandeep Dange. The room was booked in the name of Manoj Singh, a name that Joshi assumed for this meeting.
According to the chargesheet, Indresh was the key speaker at the meeting and had asked other group members to become affiliated to different religious bodies so that the mission was accomplished successfully. The chargesheet says: “Indresh Kumar told them you all should join some religious organisations and then begin your work so that people don’t get suspicious. It should appear that you are on a religious yatra.” It adds that the roles for the different individuals were finalised at the meeting. While Joshi was allocated the prime task of exploding the bombs, Sharma and Kalsangre were asked to collect the weapons and explosives, and also carry out a recce to identify targets.
Gupta was told to arrange the SIM cards using a fake identity. Dange and Joshi were told to arrange the finance for the terror activity. Pragya was asked to manage the media after the blasts. The Ajmer Dargah blast killed three persons and injured at least 17 others. Rajasthan home minister Shanti Dhariwal said the chargesheet proved beyond doubt that Hindu extremists and senior RSS leaders were involved in the blasts in Ajmer, Hyderabad and Malegaon. “Those named in the chargesheet will be arrested immediately after the inquiry,” he said.
Interestingly, the chargesheet does not name Indresh as an accused. Sources in the government said that the ATS may later add a supplementary chargesheet to include his name. According to the chargesheet, top Hindutva leaders identified the spots to explode bombs at meetings between February 11 and 13, 2006, in the Dang area of central Gujarat where Swami Aseemanand ran his ashram. The targets included Delhi’s Jama Masjid, Ajmer Dargah, Hyderabad’s Mecca Masjid, Malegaon and the Samjhauta Express that ran between India and Pakistan. The bombs used were allegedly made at Kalsangre’s Shanti Vihar Colony residence in Indore.
The two bombs (one never went off) were planted at the Ajmer Dargah by Dange, Kalsangre and Joshi. Later, all three went underground. The chargesheet refers to the involvement of Abhinav Bharat, a Maharashtra-based Hindutva organisation that allegedly exploded the Malegaon bombs in 2008. It alleges that Swami Aseemanand was in contact with Pragya Thakur and Shrikant Purohit, both accused in the bombing. The ATS alleged that the conspiracy was hatched by this module of saffron terrorists at Jaipur to carry out a series of blasts for taking revenge against bombings unleashed by Islamist outfits in India.
The saffron joint family did not take much time to close ranks and attributed Indresh’s implication in the Ajmer blast chargesheet as a “political conspiracy” hatched by the Congress. Both the RSS and the BJP have always said in the face of increasing evidence of a Hindutva terror network that they do not support anyone involved in terrorist activities. But Indresh’s situation could be tricky for both. As part of a 21- member central executive of the RSS comprising the top brass such as Mohan Bhagwat, Suresh Joshi, Suresh Soni, et al, the RSS can neither disown Indresh nor distance itself from his activities. The RSS had said nothing in defence of other pracharaks such as Devender Gupta and his accomplice Lokesh Sharma. The two were arrested in connection with the Ajmer blasts and had sidelined two lower-ranking Sangh officebearers Ashok Berry and Ashok Varshney, both of whom were questioned in connection with the Hindutva terror network.
For the Rajasthan ATS, a vital clue turned out to be a SIM card. It took a year for the agency to identify the code of ‘Vande Mataram’ that was used by those named in the chargesheet, including Gupta, who was arrested this April while travelling to Udaipur with his cousin. Thakur’s call details, according to the chargesheet, reveal that the number that was fed as ‘Vande Mataram’ belonged to Sunil Joshi, an RSS pracharak in Mahu district of Madhya Pradesh. Joshi, along with Pragya, was also a founder of Jai Vande Mataram organisation. Later, Swami Aseemanand linked this organisation with Abhinav Bharat to develop a group of fundamentalists to carry out the bomb blasts.
-------------
RSS big gun in the dock for plotting Ajmer blast
With inputs from Poornima Joshi and Dalip Singh in New Delhi
Continued from Page 1
attacked the offices of MAIL TODAY and the TV Today network, vandalising property. The 806-page chargesheet filed on Friday alleges that the conspiracy to explode bombs in Ajmer as well as several other Indian cities was hatched in the Gujarati Samaj Guest House in Jaipur in October 2005. It includes 213 support documents and a list of 133 witnesses. The three prime conspirators named are Devendra Gupta, Lokesh Sharma and Chandra Shekhar Leve. The chargesheet was issued by additional SP of the Rajasthan ATS Satyendra Singh Ranawat.
Leve was produced in the court of Ajmer’s acting chief judicial magistrate Jagendra Kumar Agrawal. The Rajasthan ATS also submitted jail warrants for Gupta and Sharma, currently lodged in a Hyderabad jail in connection with the Mecca Masjid blasts.
Two other accused Sandeep Dange and Ramji Kalsangre, both residents of Indore in Madhya Pradesh, are absconding. They are also accused in the Mecca Masjid case. According to the ATS, no organisation was involved in the terror act but some of their members formed a group of terrorists to execute the crime.” The chargesheet provides some sensational details. According to the document, a secret meeting was held in Room 26 of the Gujarati Samaj Guest House on October 31, 2005.
The seven persons who attended the meeting were Indresh Kumar, Pragya Thakur (accused in the Malegaon blasts), Sunil Joshi (an RSS pracharak who was shot dead in December 2007), Ramchandra alias Ramji Kalsangre, Devendra Gupta, Lokesh Sharma and Sandeep Dange. The room was booked in the name of Manoj Singh, a name that Joshi assumed for this meeting.
According to the chargesheet, Indresh was the key speaker at the meeting and had asked other group members to become affiliated to different religious bodies so that the mission was accomplished successfully. The chargesheet says: “Indresh Kumar told them you all should join some religious organisations and then begin your work so that people don’t get suspicious. It should appear that you are on a religious yatra.” It adds that the roles for the different individuals were finalised at the meeting. While Joshi was allocated the prime task of exploding the bombs, Sharma and Kalsangre were asked to collect the weapons and explosives, and also carry out a recce to identify targets.
Gupta was told to arrange the SIM cards using a fake identity. Dange and Joshi were told to arrange the finance for the terror activity. Pragya was asked to manage the media after the blasts. The Ajmer Dargah blast killed three persons and injured at least 17 others. Rajasthan home minister Shanti Dhariwal said the chargesheet proved beyond doubt that Hindu extremists and senior RSS leaders were involved in the blasts in Ajmer, Hyderabad and Malegaon. “Those named in the chargesheet will be arrested immediately after the inquiry,” he said.
Interestingly, the chargesheet does not name Indresh as an accused. Sources in the government said that the ATS may later add a supplementary chargesheet to include his name. According to the chargesheet, top Hindutva leaders identified the spots to explode bombs at meetings between February 11 and 13, 2006, in the Dang area of central Gujarat where Swami Aseemanand ran his ashram. The targets included Delhi’s Jama Masjid, Ajmer Dargah, Hyderabad’s Mecca Masjid, Malegaon and the Samjhauta Express that ran between India and Pakistan. The bombs used were allegedly made at Kalsangre’s Shanti Vihar Colony residence in Indore.
The two bombs (one never went off) were planted at the Ajmer Dargah by Dange, Kalsangre and Joshi. Later, all three went underground. The chargesheet refers to the involvement of Abhinav Bharat, a Maharashtra-based Hindutva organisation that allegedly exploded the Malegaon bombs in 2008. It alleges that Swami Aseemanand was in contact with Pragya Thakur and Shrikant Purohit, both accused in the bombing. The ATS alleged that the conspiracy was hatched by this module of saffron terrorists at Jaipur to carry out a series of blasts for taking revenge against bombings unleashed by Islamist outfits in India.
The saffron joint family did not take much time to close ranks and attributed Indresh’s implication in the Ajmer blast chargesheet as a “political conspiracy” hatched by the Congress. Both the RSS and the BJP have always said in the face of increasing evidence of a Hindutva terror network that they do not support anyone involved in terrorist activities. But Indresh’s situation could be tricky for both. As part of a 21- member central executive of the RSS comprising the top brass such as Mohan Bhagwat, Suresh Joshi, Suresh Soni, et al, the RSS can neither disown Indresh nor distance itself from his activities. The RSS had said nothing in defence of other pracharaks such as Devender Gupta and his accomplice Lokesh Sharma. The two were arrested in connection with the Ajmer blasts and had sidelined two lower-ranking Sangh officebearers Ashok Berry and Ashok Varshney, both of whom were questioned in connection with the Hindutva terror network.
For the Rajasthan ATS, a vital clue turned out to be a SIM card. It took a year for the agency to identify the code of ‘Vande Mataram’ that was used by those named in the chargesheet, including Gupta, who was arrested this April while travelling to Udaipur with his cousin. Thakur’s call details, according to the chargesheet, reveal that the number that was fed as ‘Vande Mataram’ belonged to Sunil Joshi, an RSS pracharak in Mahu district of Madhya Pradesh. Joshi, along with Pragya, was also a founder of Jai Vande Mataram organisation. Later, Swami Aseemanand linked this organisation with Abhinav Bharat to develop a group of fundamentalists to carry out the bomb blasts.
=============
[related report]
Mail Today, 24 October 2010
‘Purohit trying to divide the Sangh Parivar at behest of Cong leaders’
By Dalip Singh in New Delhi
A 14-PAGE document circulating among the top echelons of radical Hindutva organisations has come up with a conspiracy theory that gives an intriguing twist to the entire saffron terror plot. The document alleges that sacked Military Intelligence officer Lt Colonel Srikant Purohit, indicted for carrying out the Malegaon blast, had the blessings of the intelligence agencies as well as Congress politicians in power. It also says that the investigating agencies are leaking information to the media to malign the image of the RSS and other Hindu organisations.
But the intelligence agencies and investigating authorities have denied the serious insinuations in the unsigned document, purportedly initiated by an ultra-right Hindu organisation. Sources claim that sympathisers of Sangh Parivar members, under the scanner for carrying out terror strikes, are behind the move. The document begins with a possible theory that originated in 2004-05. It claims that on the directions of the intelligence agencies and politicians, Purohit — who is behind the bars now — was attempting to divide the Sangh Parivar.
The document even talks of alleged meetings between Purohit and some senior leaders of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. The sum and substance of the text in it is that Purohit attempted to provoke the feelings of Hindu leaders by stating that no party was espousing the cause of the majority community. This move, it says, was aimed at driving a wedge between them and the BJP. To prove the point that Purohit was acting at the behest of intelligence agencies, the document claims that during the meetings the dismissed officer cited some classified documents which were not in the public domain.
The papers further claim that Purohit used these documents to assert that the BJP was out to finish a vocal VHP leader. However, there were no takers in the Sangh Parivar for the former MI man’s theory as he was unable to produce the so-called classified documents. In a bid to distance the Sangh Parivar from the alleged saffron terror network, the document claims that Purohit made contacts with rogue Hindu fundamentalists who were divorced from organisations like the VHP and the RSS.
It gives the names of the accused in the blast cases of Ajmer and Malegaon as those influenced by Purohit. And the RSS as well as other right-wing outfits have publicly disowned Swami Dayanand Pandey, the late Sunil Joshi, Devendra Gupta, Lokesh Sharma and Thakur Pragya Singh after their names cropped up in the terror cases. Interestingly, the document claims that Pandey has links with the Congress. These people, the document claims, often met on premises owned by the government and the army, and attempted to rope in fresh faces as well as organisations in their mission to give a befitting reply to Islamic terrorism.
Intriguingly, the document propounds another theory. According to it, a misinformation campaign was launched by the incarcerated Pandey that the RSS is moving away from hardline Hindutva to mend fences with Muslims and Christians.
=======
Mail Today, 24 October 2010
Chargesheet reveals Samjhauta clues
By Aman Sharma in New Delhi
THERE could be a breakthrough in the deadlocked investigation into the bombings in the Samjhauta Express and the Jama Masjid in Delhi.
For the first time, there is an official admission by an investigating agency that these two were on the hitlist of Hindutva terrorists involved in Ajmer Sharif, Malegaon and the Mecca Masjid in Hyderabad.
The Rajasthan Anti- Terrorism Squad’s 806- page chargesheet on the Ajmer blasts says the module behind these three targets had sinister plans to target the Samjhauta Express and Jama Masjid as well. It was not clear though whether this terror cell could execute with its plan.
Over 60 Pakistanis died in the Samjhauta Express blast on February 19, 2007, while 13 people were wounded in blasts inside Jama Masjid on April 14, 2006 — months after this module ( according to the Rajasthan ATS) chose them as targets at a meeting chaired by Swami Asimanand in February 2006.
The five targets were apparently chosen at a marathon meeting in Gujarat by the module comprising Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, Swami Asimanand, Ramji Kalsangre, Sandeep Dange and Sunil Joshi, the chargesheet says.
“ From February 11 to 13 in 2006, Swami Asimanand organised a Shabri Kumbh at his Shabri Dham in Gujarat. All the hardline Hindu activists like Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, Sunil Joshi, Ramji Kalsangre, Lokesh Sharma and Sandeep Dange took part at the meeting and discussed avenging the terror attacks at the Akshardham temple in Gujarat in 2002 and other Hindu religious shrines. They drew up a list of five targets — Samjhauta Express, Mecca Masjid, Malegaon, Ajmer Sharif and Jama Masjid,” it says.
A source said Lokesh Sharma, the man who did a recce of Ajmer Sharif, confirmed this meeting after his arrest.
The bombs used in the Samjhauta Express are believed to have been assembled in Indore. But the suspected bomber, Sunil Joshi, was found mysteriously murdered in Dewas, Madhya Pradesh on December 27, 2007.
These details could let the National Investigation Agency ( NIA), which is probing the Samjhauta Express case, vital leads.
Labels:
Abhinav Bharat,
Ajmer,
Hindutva,
rajasthan,
RSS,
Swami Asimananda,
Terrorism