CHENNAI: On an intelligence tip-off, Tamil Nadu's Coimbatore police arrested five members of a gang for allegedly planning to murder a man for opposition conversion bid.
The gang had reached Coimbatore a couple of days ago and was planning to execute Kumaresan, a resident of the city who had opposed the conversion of his son Arunkumar to Islam following his marriage to a Muslim girl.
Police said that Arunkumar (28) of Coimbatore, son of Kumaresan was working in a private firm in Hyderabad and married a Muslim girl, Sahana Hashmi Mohammed of Tiruvarur.
The marriage was solemnised at a temple in Coimbatore as per Hindu customs with the support of Arunkumar's parents. After the marriage, the girl's mother Noor Nisha, an office-bearer of a Muslim outfit in Tiruvarur called up Arunkumar and asked him to convert to Islam. This was opposed by Arun's father Kumaresan.
Infuriated, Nisha, according to police, approached Fakruddin who is President of Indian Muslim Development Association (IMDA) from Kodungaiyur in Chennai, and allegedly sought his help to eliminate Kumaresan. Fakruddin conspired with four others, Imran Khan, Saddam Hussein, M. Mohammad Ali Jinnah and T. Ajai from Uttar Pradesh to murder Kumaresan and reached Coimbatore with deadly weapons.
However, the Tamil Nadu police intelligence tipped off the local police on the presence of strangers in Coimbatore for the past two days. Selvapuram police promptly acted and arrested the gang on Tuesday night and seized their weapons.
The criminal gang was charged with Sections 153 A(1)(b), 120 B of the IPC, and Section 7(1)(a) of Criminal Law Amendment Act and remanded to judicial custody at Avinashi Jail.
Police said that they had received specific intelligence report of a gang of an Islamic outfit camping in Coimbatore to commit murder with deadly weapons procured from North Indian states.
Saddam Hussein was the first to be arrested. He confessed that he was monitoring Kumaresan's movement and was passing on the information to other gang members.
Five-member gang arrested in TN for murder attempt