Fake Story

    In the absence of the Police refusing to talk to the team, the team had to construct the police story on the basis of their informal discussions with some police officials at the spot where incident took place and the information on the incident by various newspapers citing their source as police. The story approximately would go as follows:

The state Intelligence had information of the likely terrorist attack on the RSS headquarters for a long time (7 to 8 months). On the previous day, i.e., Wednesday, May 31, 2006 the Nagpur Police was informed by Intelligence Bureau, Delhi that a team of four terrorists were reaching Nagpur within next 72 hours with a plan to attack the RSS headquarters. They were later informed that the terrorist team had already entered the city. The general security alert was enforced from the previous day with Nakabandi at various places and searches in hotels and lodges. The RSS headquarters in Mahal as well as the Smriti Mandir in Rshimbag already had permanent police security for the last 17 years. However, with this information the security was tightened there and at the other important places.         

The Special squad of the City police was kept on high alert. The following night, i.e., on Thursday, this special squad comprising PSI Arvind Saraf, Jagannath More and Rajendra Tiwari in a Tata Sumo, while on the patrolling duty in the Central Avenue area spotted a white Ambassador car with a red beacon atop at Chitar Ol Chowk moving towards Badkas Chowk in suspicious manner. It began tailing it. The Ambassador car turned from Badkas Chowk towards Ayachit Mandir and then turning form Bhosla Ved Shala into the lane going towards the RSS headquarters. It caught the car, stopped some 30 feet past the steel barricade. The three terrorists, who were in the police uniform in the car opened fire on police. One of the terrorists hurled a hand grenade at the police but it did not explode as its pin was not removed. All the terrorists were gunned down by the Police who opened fire in response. None of the policemen was injured as they were wearing bulletproof jackets. However, one PSI Arvind Saraf reportedly had a pressure hit of bullet at stomach and was admitted in the hospital. Two vehicles were used in the operation by the police- one blue colored Tata Sumo and a Qualis. The tailing cars were unmarked and all police personal in it were wearing plain clothes.  

The sequence of events around the incident proper is still not clear: When the Ambassador car tried to enter the lane; it must have first confronted the policemen at the barricade and steel barricade itself. How exactly they went past it without being questioned by the policemen? Who were these policemen? What happened to them? Considering the small distances involved (maximum 2 Km), the tailing police vehicles could not be much behind (as they followed it closely after spotting the car) to spare time for the terrorists to remove the steel barricade and make their way past it. While Tata Sumo is presented having faced the brunt of terrorist bullets, the role of the other vehicle (Qualis) is not clear.   

    There is PSI Arvind Saraf’s version (Sakal, June 2) of the incident that throws light on some of these aspects: “When we spotted a red beacon Ambassador while coming from the Badkas chowk after our night patrol, we had a suspicion and hence we turned our Tata Sumo in the direction of the car. We shouted at the car many times that we were police and asked them to stop. But the car did not slow down. It had a red lamp but we did not find any flag or star insignia in its front. When it turned towards the Lakdi pul, it confirmed our suspicion. We immediately followed the car. The car straightway dashed against the steel barricade on the lane leading to RSS building. Immediately, the firing started. The terrorists could not get time to take back the car as they had dashed against the barricade. Before they could come out of the car, police had started firing. A huge firing also began from the Ambassador car. We responded to it from behind our Tata Sumo. At that time I felt like a bullet piercing my stomach as I felt some stomach pain. I was saved as I had a bullet proof jacket on me.” This is an important version because it comes straight from the person who was actually involved in the incident.    

The gun battle lasted for about 20 minutes in which the militants fired 76 rounds while the cops retaliated with 63 rounds.  The terrorists had three AK-M automatic weapons, 12 hand grenades and 5.6 Kgs of highly explosive materials with them.  They also had three spare magazines for their fire arms each carrying 30 rounds. They had hundred and twenty rounds each. Besides, the Police recovered a diary, bags with clothes and other things, wet soaps and underwears, receipts of shoes and other things, and some cash. All the three terrorists were young in the age group of 20-22 years. In the postmortem, as reported by the Press, the first body had one bullet, the second one had two bullets and the third one had pieces of bullets. Their bodies were preserved for seven days and were cremated with Islamic rites on June 7.

Mr S.P.S. Yadav, Commissioner of Police, Nagpur reported to have said, “looking at their preparation and determination to storm the RSS HQ at any cost despite heavy police deployment indicates that it was a ‘fidayeen’ attack.”  While on the basis of the diary, their names and their places of residences in Pakistan were disclosed to the media, the Police declined thereafter to confirm their identity. Unlike most terrorist attacks, no organization has come forward to claim responsibility of the ill fated attempt. There is absolute lack of crucial information to public even after a month after the incident: About the identity of the terrorist, the owner of the car, their local accomplices if any, their sponsors anywhere and so on.