Malegaon blast: 5 years, 3 agencies and the discovery of Hindu terror

On September 8, 2006, a bomb ripped through the textile town of Malegaon, killing 36 people and injuring 100.

The investigation has changed hands from the Anti-Terrorism Squad to the Central Bureau of Investigation and finally to the National Investigation Agency.

Nine Muslim youths were arrested by the ATS and they filed the first charge sheet in the special court before the probe was handed over to the CBI in December 2006.

The investigating agency also got a sole approver Abrar Ahmed Sayyed, 33, who "confessed" to the crime.
In 2009, the tables turned when Abrar came face to face with Sadhvi Pragya Thakur and Dayanand Pandey, an accused in the September 29, 2008, bomb blast case in Malegaon - in the special court.

Abrar turned hostile in April 2009 and alleged that the investigating officers of the ATS had forced him to "confess" the crime he never committed.

He filed an affidavit in the special MCOCA court through his elder brother and lawyer Jaleel Ahmed Ghulam Ahmed claiming that the 2006 and the 2008 blasts in Malegaon are carried out by the same accused, including Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and Dayanand Pandey, who have been arrested in the 2008 blast.
Abrar alleged that then Superintendent of Police Rajvardhan had allegedly confined him and lured him with monetary considerations to turn approver. Rajvardhan is now the additional commissioner of police, Economic Offences Wing.

Rajvardhan approached him on September 13, 2006, and offered him monetary considerations and gave him two mobile phones - for Abrar and his wife, Jannatunnisa.

Rajvardhan sent them to Nashik, Indore, and then to Ujjain where he met various Hindu religious leaders from September 22, 2006, to September 30, 2006. In Indore he even met Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur.

That’s how he recognised her when he saw her in the special court. He even identified Dayanand Pandey was the same Kashmiri Sadhu (Priest) he had met at Bholenath temple in Ujjain.
Abrar was confined for nearly three months before he was shown arrested on December 16, 2006. According Abrar, he was picked up on September 16, 2006.

However, the special court did not consider his affidavit.
Three co-accused — Noorulhudha Samsudoha, Shabbir Ahmad Masiullah and Mohammed Jahid Abdul Majeed Ansari - filed a petition in the Bombay high court taking Abrar's affidavit as basis. They had sought formation of a Special Investigation Team to probe allegations made by Abrar.  Their petition was dismissed by the HC. The Supreme Court dismissed their appeal.

The Hindu terror angle came into the picture when the NIA took over in 2006 following a confession by Naba Kumar Sarkar, 59,  popularly known as Swami Aseemanand after the CBI took him into custody in 2010.