Ahmedabad: Gujarat anti-terrorist squad (ATS) on Friday arrested Habibmiya Ganimiya, 37, for his alleged role in the December 2005 terror attack on the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru. Habibmiya was picked up from Agartala (in Tripura) where he was reportedly hiding.In December 2005, Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists had stormed the prestigious institute in army fatigues during an international seminar, and fired indiscriminately, killing one professor and injuring four others."We have informed the Bengaluru police about the arrest and will be handing over the accused to them for further investigation," said SP (ATS) Himanshu Shukla.Sources in the ATS said their team consisting of deputy superintendent of police (DSP) KK Patel, inspector Nikhil Brahmbhatt and sub-inspector Chandrashekar Panara, is still camping in Agartala.In the attack that was carried out in December 28, 2005, six terrorists of LeT and Harkat-Ul-Jihad-Ul-Islam had raided the IISc premises in a white car."They started firing with automatic weapons and lobbed grenades at participants in an international seminar. Prof MC Puri was killed in the attack while four others — Dr V Chandru of IISc, Dr Pankaj Gupta of IIT, lab assistant Vijay Patil, and Dr Sangeetha — were injured," an ATS official said.Six of the accused — Mohammed Raza-ul-Rehman, Afzal Pasha, Mehboob Ibrahim, Mirudding Khan, Nizamuddin and Munna — were arrested in 2008 and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2011. However, Habibmiya and a Pakistani national were absconding, said a source in the ATS."We got a clue about Habibmiya hiding in Agartala," a senior ATS official said. "A team was dispatched immediately and in a joint operation with Tripura police, Habibmiya was nabbed." Sources in the ATS also said that during interrogation it had come to light that Habibmiya had escorted the IISc attackers to Bangladesh and stayed with them in Komila district before and after the attack."Habibmiya was not only involved in providing logistics to the terrorists but was also actively involved in planning and helping the attackers cross over to Bangladesh," an ATS official said. The official further said that Habibmiya is an important LeT link. "We are interrogating him to know whether he had helped or is helping any other terror module to execute terror attacks," the ATS official said.Sources in the police said that Habibmiya has studied up to Class 7 and was staying with his wife and son in Agartala. "He was working as a plumber and has a good knowledge of the border areas with Bangladesh," a source said.

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