Jaunpur man first to 'reveal' sabotage plot

LUCKNOW: Much before the Bihar police came up with the rail sabotage theory, a man from Jaunpur was already keeping law enforcement agencies of UP, Maharashtra and Bihar on their toes claiming that he knew the terror operatives who had been unfastening railway tracks.
Anti-terrorist squad (ATS) of UP police and other elite units started pursuing 28-year-old resident of Kerakat tehsil, Vasant Yadav from January 6.A fax from Mumbai alerted the DGP office in Lucknow that they had received information about Vasant's supposed involvement in rail sabotage incidents reported in north India. Confirming the development, inspector general ATS, Asim Arun said that Vasant had indeed owned up to the crime. "Vasant was picked up from Pauni village in Kerakat. He seemed disoriented and the information he provided was of no value," said Arun. He also stated that Vasant was not connected to the Bihar module which came to light with the arrest of three people in Motihari district on January 15. Vasant apparently, had a reputation for talking nonsense in Pauni, a village of about 1,200 people. Vasant had even approached local village pradhan Virendra Yadav seeking the PMO's contact details to pass information about the movement of a truck loaded with tons of gold.
SP ATS (Varanasi unit) Santosh Kumar Singh said, "We took him around railway tracks in Kanpur, Varanasi and Allahabad. He claimed that along with seven to eight more men he had removed a portion of the railway tracks. But he could not explain things beyond a point."
After sustained rounds of interrogation, ATS took Virendra to Varanasi mental hospital on January 17. The on-duty doctor said that Virendra appeared to be having an 'unsound mind', but added that thorough medical examination was required to find out his actual medical condition. ATS recorded all the developments in a general diary at Kerakat police station and let him off.