The Special Investigation Team (SIT) investigating the Ernakulam Collectorate blast believes the pipe bombs used to set off the explosion may have been manufactured in Parappanangadi, Malappuram, according to sources.
The SIT is basing its theory on the fact that six months after the June 10, 2009 explosion at the Ernakulam Collectorate, four pipe bombs were recovered from the compound of a house in Chettippadi near Parappanangadi, in the district which were very similar to the ones used in the blast.
Buried in a pit in the grounds of a house belonging to a school teacher, Neduvil Puthiyakath Basheer, the nine inches long and two inches in diameter pipe bombs were dug up by labourers planting banana saplings in the grounds.
“As the bombs used to cause the explosion at the Ernakulam Collectorate are very similar to those recovered from Parappanangadi, we believe they too must have come from here,” say SIT sources.
School teacher Basheer, from whose house compound the bombs were recovered, is associated with the Mujahid movement, and was questioned by the police for terror activities following the killing of Abdul Raheem from Chettippadi, and three other Keralites in an encounter with the Kashmir police, they reveal.
The SIT believes the blast may also be linked to the Kizhakkambalam robbery and the 2002 attempted murder case involving suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba commandant, Thadiyantavide Nazir.
It suspects that the collectorate blast was the last operation carried out by the team headed by Nazir before he was arrested by the Border Security Force (BSF) near the Indo-Bangaladesh border in December 2009, say sources.