The NIA personnel posed as plumbers to access the building where Thufail was staying as a tenant, said police sources.
Slain BJP activist Praveen Nettaru. (Supplied)
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) sleuths nabbed on the night of Saturday, 4 March, an accused in the murder case of BJP youth wing leader Praveen Nettaru.
The accused, Thufail MH, was arrested from Amruthahalli in the northern part of Bengaluru, where he was living in a rented house over the past few months.
According to the NIA, he was part of the “service team” — apparently a euphemism for a team that carried out the dirty work — that hacked Nettaru to death on 26 July last year.
Thufail was the Kodagu District head of the service team of the banned Popular Front of India (PFI). He was also apparently the former PFI district secretary of the Kodagu District.
Thufail was living alone in a room on the second floor of a three-storeyed building as a tenant in the Maruthi Layout in Dasarahalli in North Bengaluru.
According to the building’s owner, Nanjundappa, he lived alone and did not talk or interact with anyone. Thufail is a native of Gadduge in the Madikeri district of Karnataka.
After painstakingly pursuing and developing leads from various sources, a team of NIA sleuths managed to track the absconder to this hideout in Amruthahalli.
With the jurisdictional Amruthahalli police in the loop, a team of NIA sleuths posing as plumbers with wrenches and other equipment gained entry into the building.
Once in his room, they pinned down Thufail and overpowered him while he was busy preparing dinner for himself on Saturday night, police sources told South First.
According to the NIA’s official release, Thufail was wanted in the murder case of Praveen Nettaru, the BJP Yuva Morcha member who was murdered last year in the Dakshina Kannada district.
In January this year, the NIA filed a charge-sheet against 20 accused before an NIA Special Court in Bengaluru. Six of those named as accused are still absconding.
The NIA also announced a cash reward of ₹5 lakh for information regarding them.
According to NIA sleuths, Thufail MH played a significant role in the PFI’s larger conspiracy to murder leaders of a particular community.
He also provided shelter and a safe harbour at one Ashiyana residency of Koppa Village in the Mysuru district for the three assailants of this case, who hacked Nettaru to death.
Thufail MH is also one of those accused in the murder case of Prashanth Poojari, registered at the Kushalnagar Rural Police Station.
He is also an accused in a case of the attempted murder of a VHP leader named Ganesh. This case was registered with the Madikeri Rural Police Station.
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