The corridors of the special MCOCA court in Mumbai was where the accused in a terror-related cases discussed how to recruit youngsters for “jihad” and arrange their training, according to a witness in the Pune blasts case.
Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad filed a 3,857-page chargesheet on April 30 in the case related to last year’s coordinated low-intensity blasts in Pune. It named Syed Feroz, Irfan Landge, Imran Khan, Asad Khan, Sayyed Arif alias Kashif Biyabani, Munib Iqbal Memon, Farooq Bagwan and Aslam Jahagirdar alias Bunty as the accused.
According to the statement of one of the witnesses, which is a part of the chargesheet, Kashif, the brother of Ashif Biyabani, an accused in the 2006 Aurangabad arms haul case, often came to the MCOCA court to meet Ashif. The witness, whose name is not disclosed, said he was introduced to Biyabani brothers and other accused of the arms haul case in 2006 in the court premises.
“In one of the visits to the court, I heard some of the accused in the arms haul case talking to Kashif about recruiting more youths for jihad,” he said. Kashif also allegedly asked this witness to meet several people in Aurangabad, Ahmednagar and Pune for arranging financial support for the training of new recruits. According to ATS, Kashif was in close contact with the absconding accused Fayaz Kagzi, who introduced him to the other accused in the case. The agency also claimed that Kashif had gone to Saudi Arabia where he met Kagzi. As per the chargesheet, Kashif was involved in the conspiracy of the Pune blast and its execution.