Two more Patna serial blasts suspects--one each in Bihar and Jharkand--were arrested today by security agencies taking the total number of arrests in the case to four even as the NIA took over the probe.
The condition of the prime suspect Ainul alias Tarique, meanwhile, was critical with doctors saying his chances of survival were dim, dashing hopes of investigators to get vital inputs about the Sunday explosions that killed six people.
Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said the Patna blasts case has been handed over to the National Investigation Agency(NIA) following a recommendation by the Nitish Kumar government.
Patna's Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (IGIMS) Director Arun Kumar Singh told PTI that Tarique is on life support system. Tarique has splinters in his brain and there is little chance of his survival, he said.
Tabish Nyaz alias Arshad Ansari, an associate of Indian Mujahideen(IM) operative Imtiyaz Ansari, was today formally arrested, Patna police sources said.
Arshad was initially detained for questioning after he was picked up by the police yesterday from Alaula village in East Champaran district for his alleged role in the blasts at Narendra Modi's rally and at the Patna railway station.
The police in Patna lodged an FIR against him at the Gandhi Maidan police station charging him with conspiracy in the blasts, the sources said.
Arshad was produced before the Chief Judicial Magistrate Prabal Dutta who remanded him to 14 days custody.
He was rounded up for questioning in connection with the serial blasts after his phone figured in a list of contacts of Ansari, who was arrested soon after the first blast at a toilet on platform number 10 at the railway junction, police said.
Assisted by Ranchi police, NIA sleuths arrested one Ujjair Ahmad in the afternoon, police sources in the Jharkand capital said.
Besides Ansari, Tausim was also arrested soon after the bomb blasts in the Bihar capital.
