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Bengal to allow POTO against Ansari?

By Our Special Correspondent

KOLKATA FEB. 16. The West Bengal Government, in all probability, will not resist the Centre's move if and when it uses the POTO against Aftab Ansari, key suspect in the American Center killings.

The Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Government will also try to move the controversial POCA Bill in the Assembly session slated to begin on February 27. POCA, the State Government thinks, would help check the growing ISI activities in the State.

Even though Bengal's ruling leftists had decided to resist POTO on principle, they would not mind its use in the Aftab Ansari case as Ansari alias Farhan Malik had been a thorn in the State Government's flesh in the past few months.

Ansari, apart from engineering violence across the country, had planned the Khadim owner, Partha Pratim Roy Burman's abduction sometime ago. ``We want the culprit's punishment,'' the Chief Minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, said.

Meanwhile, the intelligence agencies have put the State Government on alert saying that they do not rule out a major retaliatory action by the terrorists in the coming days such as hijacking an aircraft or bombing a major installation or abducting a VIP.

As precautionary measures, police have tightened security at the Kolkata and Bagdogra airports, State and police headquarters, power plants and other areas which have the potential of turning into targets of the terrorists.

Following interrogation, police have learnt that Ansari had close links with fundamentalist outfits such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Harqat-ul-Jihadi and so on.

These organisations may try to force the Government through terrorist actions to hand over Ansari to them.

The Kolkata police will also approach the Centre to press the UAE Government to hand over Asif Reza Khan's brother, Amir.

Police think that Amir Reza Khan heads the Asif Reza Commando Force, which Ansari had mentioned at the time of the American Center killings.

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