- Two arrested for Anupgarh-Suratgarh railway line blast.
- Accused, from Gurdaspur, suspected of Pakistan's ISI links.
- Blast damaged track pillars; IED planted after reconnaissance.
Two people, including a woman, have been arrested in connection with a blast at the Anupgarh-Suratgarh railway line in Rajasthan's Sri Ganganagar district, the officials said.
The arrested accused have been identified as Devendra Singh and Mahakdeep Kaur. Both of them are residents of Gurdaspur in Punjab and are suspected to have links to Pakistan's intelligence agency ISI. They were reportedly arrested in a joint operation involving the Rajasthan ATS, Rajasthan Police and Gurdaspur Police.
Bikaner Inspector General of Police (IG) Om Prakash and Sri Ganganagar Superintendent of Police (SP) Harishankar are personally questioning the accused as part of the investigation.
The blast took place on November 3 near 50 GB village after a passenger train had passed. The loud explosion was heard up to 200 meters away and damaged two pillars supporting the railway track. The blast also reportedly left behind a two-foot-deep crater.
The incident triggered a high-level investigation, involving the Rajasthan Anti-Terrorism Squad.
It is suspected that ISI was behind the attack and had conspired to blow up an entire passenger train by planting an IED on the track. The accused had conducted a reconnaissance of the blast site before carrying out the attack.
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Reports suggest that a Pakistani handler named 'Shah' had assigned them the task to carry out the explosion. A News18 report suggests that the accused had previously planned an attack around October 6 when they first visited Sri Ganganagar. Later, on October 12-13, they tried again to plant the explosives but could not do so.
Eventually, on Nov 3, they managed to plant the IED before the explosion at 9:45 PM. The police have recovered two pistols and 46 cartridges from the arrested individuals, which were supplied to them from Pakistan.
As per the report, the two accused had arrived in Sri Ganganagar bare-handed and were provided the IED in packets at multiple points.