Numerous astonishing and disturbing details about the deceased Jamesha Mubin and his arrested accomplices have been revealed as the investigation into the Coimbatore car blast in Tamil Nadu proceeds. It is highly suspected that the Jihadi terrorists were planning to terrorise the country and instil fear in common people. According to a report, the car blast was not an accident but it was a suicide mission by Mubin who died in the blast.
The Times Of India cited a witness who asserted that around 4 AM on Diwali, the vehicle stopped in front of the Sangameswara temple in Kottaimedu, and Jamesha Mubin got out, engulfed in flames, before collapsing on the ground a brief distance away. Before anyone in the area, including police officers at a nearby police checkpoint, could respond, the body was scorched.
Mubin expected his suicide bombing operation would obliterate a radius of 50 to 100 metres, including the temple and numerous apartment complexes nearby, according to the interrogation of the six alleged IS jihadists detained thus far in the probe.
Mubin and two accused accomplices, Mohammed Azarudheen and K Afsar Khan loaded three steel drums carrying potassium nitrate, aluminium powder, sulphur, charcoal, nails, and ball bearings into the car late Saturday (October 22), a day before the anticipated explosion. CCTV cameras, according to an official, captured the incident. According to the official, all three including Jamesha also did a recce of the Koniamman temple on Big Bazaar Street as well as the Puliyakulam Mundhi Vinayagar shrine.
Jamesha Mubin and the arrested two also went to an LPG booking station in Gandhi Park, where they obtained the two cylinders recovered in the wrecked vehicle. This was confirmed by an invoice sent to them for their purchase by the booking centre. The trio then went to Lorrypet’s old market area and bought three steel drums.
Sivakumar, a former NIA officer who is now with the Coimbatore municipal police, was crucial in putting together the fragments of intelligence that gave investigators a smell of the terror plan. According to an insider quoted by TOI, “the ex-NIA officer questioned Mubin in 2019 about his suspected links with radical elements.” Sivakumar was the one who ordered the search of Mubin’s home, which resulted in the confiscation of 75kg of mixed material necessary to make bombs.
Investigators have noted that, had the explosion from one of the two LPG cylinders in the car taken place as planned, rows of homes along the road leading to the shrine may have been impacted devastatingly. According to police theory, the car bomb didn’t work as planned because Mubin had no proper training in bomb-making. It is suspected that he was radicalised after reading ISIS propaganda material, and leaned about explosives from the Internet only. Had he obtained training in terrorist tactics, this could have been a deadly terror attack.
As the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has also registered its first FIR in the case, the investigation is proceeding with diligence. So far, six individuals have been arrested in the case. They are identified as, Mohammad Thalka (age 25), Mohammad Azarudheen (age 25), Mohammad Riaz (age 27), Firoz Ismail (age 27), Mohammad Nawaz Ismail (age 27) and Afsar Khan.
OpIndia has reported how Jamesha Mubin and his accomplices planned the Easter blast in Sri Lanka-style bombings and how they are allegedly linked to the Islamic State and the mastermind of 1998 serial blasts in the city.