Suspected Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) operative Safiqul, who was recently arrested by the CID from a former Army Naik’s house in Malda, has reportedly told his interrogators that of the two of his Dhaka-based handlers, one is an official at the Pakistan High Commission in Dhaka.

As the plot unravels, officers from the Army’s intelligence wing have joined the probe and are interrogating ex-serviceman Haji Akhtar Hussain, in whose house Safiqul was staying.

Sources in the CID told The Indian Express that the Pakistani official was directing Safiqul to carry out espionage, while the other handler was a senior LeT member.

The CID, however, refused to divulge the name of the Pak official. “At this moment, we don’t want to name the High Commission official but according to Safiqul, he is connected to the ISI.

Safiqul has admitted to being instructed to gather information on the Indian Army’s deployment along the Bangla border as well as troop movements. He was being helped in this by retired army man Haji Akhtar Hussain,” sources said.

The other Dhaka-based handler, identified by Safiqul alternately as Taimur bhai and Abdul Karim of the LeT, came in contact with him between 1998 and 2000 while both were doing time in Tihar jail.

“Taimur bhai taught Safiqul how to use a computer and indoctrinated him in LeT philosophy. Taimur bhai was released in 2000 and went to Lahore and then to Dhaka.

After Safiqul’s release in 2003 and subsequent return to his native place Rajshahi in Bangladesh, he was contacted by Taimur who gave him Rs 1 lakh,” sources added.

Using this money, Safiqul renovated his residence in Rajshahi and got married in 2004.

From then on, Taimur bhai would give orders asking him to smuggle LeT terrorists across the Indo-Bangla border, CID sources said.

Meanwhile, a police team from Uttar Pradesh is on its way to the city to interrogate Safiqul for his role in procuring RDX for terrorist attacks in the state, DIG CID (Operations) Siddh Nath Gupta said.

“The RDX was intended for terror attacks in UP, but Safiqul was caught

with the explosives at the Indo-Bangla border and sent to jail. Following his capture in Malda, enquiries have come in from several states, but the UP police are keen to question him,” Gupta said.

Sources said Safiqul had built up a wide network in UP, and had four bases there — two near Bareilly and two more in Gorakhpur’s Siddharth Nagar near the Indo-Nepal border.