By IANS,
Kathmandu : A 41-year-old civil engineer, who claims to have received his degree from India’s Chennai city, has been arrested in Nepal for allegedly planning a series of explosions in four major cities with the avowed aim of reinstating Hinduism as the state religion.
Vinod Kumar Pandey, who was produced by Nepal Police in court in Biratnagar Tuesday, told his interrogators that he studied in the south Indian city and used the Internet to get knowhow about explosives.
Pandey was arrested Sunday from Biratnagar, located on the Indo-Nepal border, with explosives and ingredients used to make bombs.
He headed the Ranvir Sena, a shadowy outfit in Nepal that was involved in extortion, abduction and blasts in the Terai plains.
Police said the Sena, which is not linked to the armed organisation of landlords in India’s Bihar state of the same name, was planning bomb attacks in Kathmandu, Biratnagar, Birgunj and Pokhara. It had also planned attacks against high-profile individuals, police said.
The long-haired, suave Pandey spoke fluent English and used the Internet to download information on how to make bombs. The rented house where he was caught was converted into a ‘mini laboratory’ to make explosives, police said.
He also masqueraded as a bona fide engineer, working with a constructor who had been contracted by Surya Nepal, ITC’s subsidiary in Nepal, to erect a building in Biratnagar.
Pandey used aliases like Bhagirath Singh, Vajra Singh and Radguvar Singh. Police Superintendent Devendra Subedi said they are continuing investigations to see if he or the Sena have links with militant groups in India.
The Ranvir Sena claimed it was working to reinstate Hinduism as the state religion. Nepal, once the only Hindu kingdom in the world, became a secular republic after a historic election last year.
Pandey’s arrest came a day after police arrested the chief of another underground militant Hindu organisation.
Ram Prasad Mainali, who headed the Nepal Defence Army (NDA), was arrested in neighbouring Jhapa district Saturday.
The NDA was responsible for attacks on two mosques and a Catholic church, killing at least seven people.