NEW DELHI: A top Jaish-e-Mohammed operative was arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police late on Thursday. The suspect, Sajjad Khan (27), was tailed for close to a month before being nabbed from near Lajpat Rai market Khan, a resident of Tral in Pulwama, was wanted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the aftermath of an attack on a CRPF convoy at Pulwama. He has been taken on remand. The agencies are now looking for two other youths, Tanveer from Tral and Bilal from Gadpora, whom Khan had recruited as fidayeen.Confirming the arrest, DCP (Special Cell) Pramod Kushwaha told TOI that Khan had been tasked to create a sleeper cell and a hideout for the cadres in Delhi. Khan had also conducted the recce of at least a dozen places in NCR on the instructions of his Pakistan-based handler.Police tracked down a phone number generated by an application called TextNow that was used to communicate with Pulwama attack mastermind Mudassir Khan, who was gunned down by security forces in Kashmir on March 11. Mudassir had used the number +190460**123 generated by the app and sent a Whatsapp text to Khan hours after the Pulwama attack on February 12. This communication was intercepted and Khan’s number was eventually tracked down to near Daryaganj.Khan was found to have checked into a central Delhi guesthouse. On March 21, he had stepped out to visit Red Fort when a team led by ACPs Lalit Mohan Negi and Hriday Bhushan arrested him.Police said Khan had left the Valley soon after the Pulwama attack. “He was sent to Delhi specifically to carry out reconnaissance of important targets. He was supposed to radicalise and recruit Muslim youths of UP and other states and provide them weapons training, explosives and field craft. The cadres were sent to raise funds and collect weapons. Khan was staying under the guise of a shawl vendor,” Kushwaha said. In the last week of February, the cell got an input that a Jaish man was in Delhi to establish a sleeper cell.Khan said Mudassir had started visiting his house soon after the death of his eldest brother, Ishfaq. “He motivated me and my brother Shaukat to join the jihad. I was working as a stone-pelter and overground worker. I initially provided information about movement of convoys and cordon and search operations carried out by security forces in Pulwama. Impressed by my work, Mudassir instructed me to to spot young Kashmiri youths for fidayeen attacks,” Khan told his interrogators.“On the day of the Pulwama attack, Mudassir contacted me on WhatsApp and asked me to leave the Valley and proceed to Delhi. I was to be in touch with my handlers on TextNow and WhatsApp only. Mudassir also sent me the video of Adil Dar — the fidayeen who carried out the attack. I saw the video and deleted it from my phone,” Khan said.

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