Punjab Police on Saturday evening arrested the second accused who lobbed a grenade at a house in the upscale Sector 10 area in Chandigarh, officials said.
The accused has been identified as Vishal and was arrested from Delhi by a team of State Special Operation Cell (SSOC), Amritsar, in coordination with central agencies, a senior police official, who did not wish to be named, added.
As per police, Vishal, who originally belonged to the Dera Baba Nanak area, was also working as a carpenter in Jammu and Kashmir for the last couple of years along with another accused Rohan Masih.
Masih was arrested from Amritsar on Friday.
According to police, the main accused, Rohan and Vishal were allegedly promised 5 lakh by Happy Passia, a US-based gangster, who operates a terror module on behalf of Pakistan-based terrorist, Harwinder Singh Rinda.
The terror outfit is believed to have provided hand grenades and weapons to Rohan Masih which were smuggled via drones from across the international border with Pakistan.
“Following the attack, both accused boarded a bus to Amritsar and later went their separate ways,” the police official added.
On September 11 evening, the two accused had traveled in an auto-rickshaw and lobbed an explosive device at a house in Sector 10, Chandigarh believing it to be the residence of retired superintendent of police Jaskirat Singh Chahal. Until two years ago, he had been living on rent on the first floor of the Sector 10 house.
Auto-rickshaw driver Kuldeep was arrested first on the same day of the incident.
The AIG SSOC, Amritsar Sukhminder Singh Mannon Friday said that prima facie it appears that the same terror group had attempted a similar attack at the same location last year as well.
That attempt was foiled by the Punjab Police with the arrest of two operatives identified as Bikramjit Singh alias Raja of Batala and Bawa Singh of Majitha, he added.
After the attack, a social media post under the name of US-based Khalistani gangster Harpreet Singh, alias Happy Passia, claimed responsibility.
Passia arranged finances, logistics
Punjab director general of police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav said that
one sophisticated 9MM Glock pistol and ammunition were recovered from Masih.
The targeted property belongs to KK Malhotra, aged 100, who had retired as the principal of an institute in Himachal Pradesh.
The police sources say that Pakistan-based Babbar Khalsa International terrorist Harwinder Singh Rinda and his gang were tasked with targeting Chahal after the 1986 incident.
