Delhi Blast Accused Doctors Were Radicalised During MBBS Course, Internship: Sources

The doctors involved in the deadly November 10 Delhi blast were radicalised over the last five years, sources close to the investigators told NDTV on Monday.

Fifteen people were killed and over a dozen left injured when a Hyundai i20 car driven by Umar-un-Nabi, a Kashmiri doctor affiliated with Al-Falah University in Faridabad, near Delhi, exploded near the iconic Red Fort.

The key accused in the case have been identified as - Muzammil Shakeel Ganai, Adeel Ahmed Rather and his brother Muzaffar Ahmed Rather, Kashmiri doctors who also worked at Al-Falah University, and Mufti Irfan Ahmad Wagay, also a Kashmir resident.

While Muzammil, Adeel and Mufti have been arrested along with their aide, Shaheen Saeed, a resident of Uttar Pradesh's Lucknow who also taught at Al-Falah University, Muzaffar has reportedly fled the country.

Sources said their radicalisation began when they were pursuing the MBBS course or doing internships. Their handlers began working on them in 2020 and gradually brainwashed them into potential suicide bombers.

They were also shown AI-generated videos depicting Muslim genocide to sow seeds of hate and recruit them for the terror attacks, sources said.

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The accused were part of a "white-collar" terror module linked to the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed and the Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, an al-Qaeda-affiliated terror group, that was busted just before the Delhi blast.

Sources said that Mufti Irfan Ahmad Wagay was the one who radicalised and converted the first member of this cell - Muzammil Shakeel Ganai, whom he met at the Government Medical College in Srinagar in 2023.

Muzammil then helped Wagay expand his terrorist network by recruiting Adeel Ahmed Rather, Umar-un-Nabi and Shaheen Saeed.

The investigation has revealed that they had plans for as many as 32 car bombs, or a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device, in Delhi and other states.

Hours before the blast, Jammu and Kashmir Police had announced that it had cracked an interstate and transnational 'white-collar' terror module. They also seized 2,900 kilograms of explosive substances, including ammonium nitrate, which was reportedly used in the Delhi blast.

(With inputs from Pradeep Dutta)