LeT sympathiser held in Chengalpattu wanted to target CM Yogi for ‘un-Holi’ acts in UP

CHENNAI: Akhlatur Mohammed, a 22-year-old from Bihar and alleged LeT sympathiser residing in Chengalpattu since January this year, plotted to target Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath after the mosques there were covered with tarpaulin sheets to 'protect' them from the splash of colours during the Holi festival, police sources here have revealed.

Arrested on April 26, immediately after the Pahalgam attack, Mohammed’s case went to the National Investigative Agency (NIA), and earlier this week, the central agency had questioned him, sources said.

Hailing from Barari village in Bihar and working as a painter at a construction site since he reached Tamil Nadu, Mohammed told the sleuths that he was pained by the situation of the mosques during the Holi festival. “Such things never happened earlier. Now the mosques' managers were told to cover the mosques with tarpaulin during the Holi season,” he reportedly told the investigators.

Mohammed was reportedly saving a good portion of his wages to procure weapons to attack CM Yogi. “He was saving around Rs 10,000 from his Rs 20,000 earnings,” sources said.

Since his arrest happened immediately after the Pahalgam terror attack, the police kept it under wraps until the NIA took over the case. The arrest was coordinated by the ATS with the help of IB inputs, and the arrest was carried out by the Chengalpattu police.

Mohammed was planning to travel to Pakistan-controlled areas to receive arms training once he saved enough money, sources added. He was systematically radicalised by a few LeT handlers with whom he was in touch during the last few years.

Though the police noted that there was no other local support for him, investigators are further trying to find out about a possible network he had created in Tamil Nadu and Bihar.