ISIS Man Arrested From Haryana, Had Surveyed UP's Ram Mandir, Somnath Temple: Sources | Exclusive
“Abdul Rehman is a 19-year-old resident of Faizabad, Uttar Pradesh. He was attempting to attack Somnath Temple in Gujarat and Ram Mandir in UP. He had done reconnaissance of the areas,” said sources, adding the operation is underway
In a joint operation, the Gujarat anti-terrorism squad (ATS) and Haryana Special Task Force (STF) arrested suspected Islamic State (ISIS or IS) operative Abdul Rahman from Faridabad in Haryana on Monday, according to sources.
“Rehman is a 19-year-old resident of Faizabad, Uttar Pradesh. He was attempting to attack Somnath Temple in Gujarat and Ram Temple in UP. He had done reconnaissance of the areas. He was radicalised with multiple locations on his radar," said sources.
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Both the temples see high footfall, with PM Narendra Modi visiting the Somnath Temple on Sunday. Agencies are probing if he had a handler or was self-radicalised.
Sources said the operation is going on even after the arrest, as multiple locations in UP were raided.
The ATS has recovered huge cache of hand grenades from Rehman. Sources refused to say more because operations are going on and interrogation underway.
MAHAKUMBH SECURITY
“During the Mahakumbh, multiple attempts of attacks were made, but were scuttled after inputs from various agencies," said sources.
Mahakumbh was held in UP’s Prayagraj from January 13 to February 26.
Some 2,750 close-circuit cameras monitored the 4000-acre Mela ground, about 250 of which are AI-enabled, fed information to the Integrated Control and Command Center (ICCC) of the Mela.
Officials said that four units of the ICCC, two of which are temporary set-ups at the Mela premises, operated as the central hub for traffic management, crowd control, security and emergency response, sanitation, healthcare and public communication during the Kumbh Mela.
A sneak peek into the command centre headquarters revealed multiple teams of policemen, comprising nearly 400 personnel, monitoring round-the-clock the CCTV feed from all 25 sectors of the giant mela ground.
Giant screens sharing real-time information based on preset algorithms, flash colour-coded data and graphical charts that are interpreted and passed on to parallel operating radio teams spread over 13 grids.
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