How a sex worker helped thwart a terror strike

A sex worker may have inadvertently prevented a major disaster at the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru.

In a revised chargesheet, the Bengaluru police has stated that minutes before Indian Mujahideen operative Mohammad Qateeel Siddiqui could plant a bomb at the Chinnaswamy Stadium, he came in contact with a sex worker, who distracted him and he ended up connecting the wires of the bomb in a wrong manner.

Siddiqui was later picked up by the police and sent to the Yerawada prison in Pune in connection with another case. He was recently killed inside the prison.

According to the Bangalore police, Siddiqui went to the Chinnaswamy Stadium along with IM operative Yasin Bhatkal to plant the bomb. He spotted a sex worker there and considered approaching her. He decided to plant the bomb and then go after her.

After planting the bomb, Siddiqui started looking for the sex worker. While the rest of the IM operatives fled the scene, he took an auto and kept looking for her. He joined the rest of his associates an hour later.

The Bangalore police learnt these details from his interrogation, while he was still in their custody.

According to investigators, the IM had aimed to kill nearly a 100 people. Siddiqui was the key operative as he was entrusted with the task of planting the bomb at the main gate of the stadium. But the bomb did not go off as planned and the terror strike was botched.

Had Siddiqui planted the bomb properly, the destruction would have been massive, said the police.