New Delhi: Lalit Jha, the alleged mastermind of the Parliament security breach case, surrendered before Delhi Police on Thursday night. Officials associated with the investigation gave this information to IANS over the phone.
“Yes, Jha is in our custody. We will share more details after interrogating him,” an officer said.
Jha surrendered before the Duty Path police station in the New Delhi district.
“He has been handed over to the Special Cell for further investigation,” a source said.
Earlier on Thursday, the four main accused arrested in this connection—Sagar Sharma, Manoranjan D., Neelam Azad, and Amol Shinde—were sent to seven-day police custody by a Delhi court.
Manoranjan is from Mysore, Sagar is from Lucknow, Neelam is from Jind, Haryana, while Amol is from Latur, Maharashtra.
The case registered against him and Jha, a native of Bihar, at the Parliament Street police station under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy), 452 (encroachment), 153 (incitement with intent to cause riot), 186 (obstructing the work of public servants) ), Section 353 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) (assault or criminal force to deter public servants from duty), as well as Sections 16 and 18 of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) have been imposed.
According to sources, the five main accused had allegedly spent the night before the incident at the residence of one Vikram alias Vicky Sharma in Sector 7, Gurugram. He left home at 8 am on Wednesday.
Vikram and his wife, Rakhi, who were detained in connection with the case, were released on Thursday evening after hours of questioning.
According to a source, Jha took the mobile phones of the four other accused just before carrying out his plan and made a hasty escape.
Jha also reportedly filmed Amol and Neelam’s protest outside Parliament and shared it with a person named Neelakha Aich, who is associated with an NGO (Samoaist Subhash) in West Bengal.
According to sources, a team of Delhi Police’s Special Cell may go to West Bengal to interrogate Aich, a second-year undergraduate student in a reputed college in the state.
Sources associated with the investigation told IANS that all the five accused involved in the security breach were connected through the ‘Bhagat Singh Fan Club’ page on Facebook. The investigators suspect that he was being guided by someone before and during the act.
