CHENNAI: National Investigation Agency (NIA) sleuths on Friday brought one of the accused in the Bengaluru Rameshwaram cafe blast case, Abdul Matheen Taha to Chennai for further investigation and he was taken to places in the city where he stayed and also to the mall in Mylapore where he bought a cap, which proved to be a breakthrough for NIA in closing in on the accused.
After hours of investigation in Chennai, he was taken back to Bengaluru, NIA sources said.
NIA had taken CCTV footage from the lodge where Taha stayed and also conducted investigations at places where Taha visited during his stay in Chennai.
On March 1, an IED explosion outside Bengaluru's Rameshwaram cafe left members of the public injured after which NIA took over investigations and after combing through several hundred hours of CCTV footage, the investigators found that the suspects were in Chennai in January and February.
NIA arrested Taha and Mussavir Hussain Shazib, both hailing from Shivamogga, in Kolkata few weeks ago.
While Taha was the supposed mastermind, Abdul Matheen worked on the escape plans and managed to evade arrest all these weeks for himself and his co-accused.