Delhi police rebut CBI, insist two arrested men are militants

New Delhi, April 21 (IANS) Five months after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said that two men arrested by Delhi Police in 2006 were innocent, the city police Tuesday sought to buttress its claim that the two were Al-Badr terrorists.

The Delhi Police Special Cell, in a fresh affidavit filed in the Delhi High Court Tuesday, said the two were in touch with a Pakistan-based terrorist.

The Special Cell claimed that the men - Mohammed Arif Qamar and Irshad Ali - were in touch with Baig, a Kashmiri militant in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir who heads the Jammu and Kashmir Islamic Front.

The Special Cell has claimed that the links to Baig were unearthed by late Inspector M.C. Sharma, who was killed in a gun battle with militants last year. The police claimed that Sharma had found that Ali was in touch with Baig and other terrorists on Jan 23, 2006.

However, the Special Cell in its charge sheet filed in a lower court on May 6, 2006, had not mentioned the duo's links with Baig.

The CBI in its closure report filed last November had concluded that the two were innocent. The probe agency had also recommended registering a case against three Delhi Police officials for implicating the men by planting arms and explosives on them.

The CBI said it had found nothing against the two arrested men.

Qamar and Ali were arrested by Special Cell from Mubarak Chowk on GT Karnal Road in north Delhi in February 2006 and have been in jail since then.

The CBI alleged that the men, who had been working as police informers, were framed by the Special Cell officials who were desperate to show results after the October 2005 Delhi blasts.