Sunday, March 6 2005 19:07 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) militants killed in an encounter in New Delhi last night (Mar 5, 2005) planned to attack software companies in Bangalore besides Indian Military Academy in Dehradun, Delhi Police said today (Mar 6).

The militants had visited Bangalore in December last year and surveyed the location of several software companies there, Joint Commissioner of Police (Special Cell) Karnal Singh told reporters.

"They planned to hit economic installations to hinder the economic development of the country," he said.

Three LeT militants, including two Pakistani nationals, were killed in an encounter at Suraj Vihar in Uttam Nagar area of Southwest Delhi.

The encounter followed the arrest of two of their associates earlier in the evening, one of whom had arrived from Jammu with a cache of ammunition for the militants.

Singh said documents seized from the slain militants of the Pakistan-based LeT revealed that they planned to carry out suicide attacks on IMA.

The Pakistani militants had been identified as Bilawal (24), who hailed from Sargodha in Pakistan and Shahnawaz (25), who was from Sindh district. The third militant killed was Shams alias Pervez Ahmed (26), a resident of Patna, who had also set up a base of the outfit in the Bihar capital.

The JCP said Bilawal's Pakistani ID card and passport had been recovered from the site of the encounter, which showed he had visited UAE and Nepal in recent months.

"This is the first time we have seized a Pakistani passport in such an encounter," Singh said.

The JCP said police had received information in the first week of last month that LeT had set up a base in Delhi. "Yesterday, it was learnt that Hamid Hussain (28) alias Abu Faisal would be coming from Jammu and Kashmir along with a consignment of explosives and would alight at Makarba Chowk in Northwest Delhi, where his associate Mohammad Sariq (24) would receive him," he said.

A team of Special Cell apprehended the duo when they were proceeding on a motorcycle and a search of Hamid's bag revealed 10.5 kg RDX.

On interrogation, Hamid disclosed he had been bringing consignments of arms and ammunition for three LeT militants who were holed up in a house in Suraj Vihar.

The Special Cell team surrounded the house at around 9 PM but the militants sensing police presence fired on them. Police returned the fire and in the gunfight which lasted for about an hour, the three militants were killed.

While the militants fired nearly 160 rounds from their AK-56 assault rifles, police fired 270 rounds, Singh said.

Three AK-56 rifles, six magazines, about 100 kg of gelatine sticks, 450 detonators, four hand grenades, a satellite phone and Rs 24,500 in cash had been recovered from them.

Early today, police raided two of their other hideouts at Batla House and Zakir Nagar in South Delhi, where several documents about money transaction, bank accounts and information about IMA were found.

Several diaries, which contained encoded telephone numbers and e-mail addresses, have also been recovered and efforts were on to decode them.

The militants had visited Dehradun in November last year to survey the location of IMA and searched for a hideout. They had also prepared some hand-drawn maps of the area besides collecting sensitive information about the installation.

The JCP said police were investigating how the information got to them and did not rule out involvement of insiders.

Hamid had revealed that he had been motivated to join LeT in 2002 by one Salim alias Doctor, who also introduced him to Shams.

In September last year, the trio had gone to Kathmandu, where they met Abdul Aziz alias Ali, a senior functionary of LeT, who instructed them to get more information about their targets and also gave them a satellite phone and a huge amount of money, he said.

Hamid also said that Shams had introduced him to Shahnawaz, who had infiltrated into India two years ago and set up a base in Patna with the help of Shams.

A police team had also been sent to Patna to locate the hideout and find whether any other persons were involved with the militants, Singh said.