A 30-year-old man, Mohammed Fahin, was arrested at Bangalore Airport yesterday on suspicion of being involved in the Mumbai blasts. Though his passport states he is Mohammed Fahin, Bangalore Police say he gave a fictitious name. Said Additional Commissioner, Law and Order, C. Chandrashekar: ‘‘His name is Mohammed Usman. The details mentioned in his passport do not tally with the real fact. A case has been registered against him for impersonation, forgery, cheating and under the Indian Passports Act.’’ A resident of Gulnam Math Colony in Hyderabad, Usman alias Fahin, was arrested after a tip-off by Mumbai police who issued a red alert for him. ‘‘He has stayed in Dubai from December 2000 to June 2002 and from June 2002 to August 2003. However, he did not have a work permit and his passport does not have a tourist visa,’’ Chandrashekar said. Further, the passport has been issued in Hyderabad and the accused embarked from Mumbai on both occasions. ‘‘The passport has been obtained by suppressing material fact,’’ Chandrashekar said. He said he was not aware if the Intelligence Bureau has asked for his custody or whether he would be handed over to the Mumbai Police. However, police sources said the IB grilled Fahin and he was presently in their custody. The confusion is expected to clear after a Mumbai Police team lands in Bangalore. Meanwhile, a team of two Mumbai inspectors, which landed in Hyderabad on Tuesday morning, informed the Hyderabad police that Fahin was suspected to be involved in the 1993 serial blasts in Mumbai and in the August 25 incidents too. Inputs from Bangalore and Trivandrum connect Fahin to one C.A.M. Basheer, an aeronautical engineer from Kerala, now believed to be operating from Dubai or Saudi Arabia. Basheer was national president of the outlawed SIMI and police guess he was in the country before the blasts. Police have also gathered that Fahin is a resident of Chandrayangutta and has been missing from the city since seven years.
