Guwahati : A team from the NIA Monday searched the house of Shahnur Alom, an absconding operative of the Jamaat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), in Assam’s Barpeta district, officials said.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) team that arrived in Assam Sunday, visited Chatala village in Barpeta, about 100 km from main city Guwahati.
While the NIA team had Sunday searched the houses of Shahnur’s brothers Jakaria and Azizur, the team Monday searched Shahnur’s house and seized some important documents, officials said.
Jakaria was earlier arrested by the special operations unit of Assam Police for his association with the JMB.
The NIA, which is probing the Oct 1 Burdwan blast case, has announced a cash award of Rs.5 lakh on Shahnur.
Shahnur, who is known by his nickname ‘Doctor’, has been absconding since Oct 6 along with his wife Sujina Begum.
“He is known as Doctor as he used to offer some kind of treatment for dental problems in the village. However, he does not have any medical degree from any recognised institution,” police said.
“Although the NIA has not announced any award for Shahnur’s wife, she is also on the wanted list. Sujina had her training in jihad at a madrassa in Bengal,” a police source said.
The source said the documents seized from Shahnur’s house may have vital information about how they were recruiting local Muslim youths to expand the network of JMB, a banned group in the neighbouring country.
Assam Police had last month arrested six people for their links with the Burdwan blast. They were also found to be associated with the Bangladesh-based terror network.
Police said that at least two of the six arrested were working in a sleeper cell of the terror module in Assam and were motivating Muslim youths for jihadi activities.
The Assam government later decided to hand over cases regarding fundamentalist activities to the NIA so that the central agency could probe the cases thoroughly.