Rajnath Singh praises, Congress salutes father of slain terrorist Saifullah

NEW DELHI/KANPUR: Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday praised the father of terror suspect Saifullah, killed by UP ATS in an encounter on Wednesday, for condemning and disowning his son over his "anti-national" activities.
In a statement made in the Lok Sabha during Zero Hour, Singh, however, refrained from linking Saifullah or the six suspects arrested in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh in connection with the Bhopal-Ujjain train blast, to the Islamic State (IS) or its ideology.
Telling MPs that he sympathised with the angst of Saifullah's father Mohammad Sartaj, he said "the government is proud of him" for his remarkable act of placing the nation above his son.
Singh recalled the statement of Sartaj, made when UP police went to him to meet him after Saifullah's death, that "I don't want to see or accept even the body of my son... He has not done the right thing... one who could not be true to his nation, cannot be my son". Sartaj had rued that while he worked hard all his life to sustain his family, he had now been let down by his son.
Appreciating Sartaj's stance, Singh said, "I am sure that the entire House will join me in sympathising with him. We should all be proud of him."
In his statement made on the floor of the Lok Sabha, Singh detailed the sequence of events on March 7, starting with the blast in the general compartment of Bhopal-Ujjain passenger train at Shajapur. Stating that Madhya Pradesh DGP and other senior police officials had immediately rushed to the site, Singh said the initial inspection of the scene of crime indicated that the accused had used an IED prepared with locally available explosives.
He informed the House that the NIA would investigate the train blast case.
After Singh's statement, Congress spokesperson Rajeev Shukla saluted Saifullah's father saying, "His decision to not accept the body of his son has shown him as a true patriot." He also lauded the Akhilesh Yadav government for prompt action in eliminating the two terrorists which the MP government failed to do.
The leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha, Ghulam Nabi Azad, also saluted the "courageous" stand of Sartaj of not accepting his slain son's body saying that a traitor cannot be related to him. "A father has rejected a son for the sake of the nation... My salute. This shows there is no dearth of nationalist Muslims in India".
Though Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan had categorically identified Islamic State as the outfit to which the suspects owed allegiance, Singh refrained from naming the IS. Sources said the home minister was of the view that unless the probe threw up evidence clearly pointing to the role of IS, it would be premature to take any names.
Complimenting central intelligence agencies and the police force of MP and UP for excellent coordination, Singh said it was due to prompt action by cops of both states that a possible threat to national security was averted.
Six suspects have been arrested so far and one killed in the case. Three persons were arrested in Madhya Pradesh and one each from Kanpur, Etawah and Auraiya in UP. The latter two, he said, were picked up for allegedly supplying weapons to the module.
On the Saifullah encounter, Singh told the MPs that police had made "vigorous attempts to arrest the suspect". However, after 12 hours of efforts and giving him multiple opportunities to surrender, ATS cops stormed his hideout and killed him.
Police, he said, recovered 8 pistols, 630 live cartridges, Rs 1.5 lakh in cash, 45g gold, three mobile phones, four SIM cards, two wireless sets and some foreign currency from Saifullah's room.