Kochi: The Kochi police on Sunday carried out evidence collection in the Nitta Gelatin office attack with arrested Maoist leader C P Moideen, alleged to be the mastermind behind the incident with which the ultra-left activists shocked the city in 2014.
Moideen, an accused in over 30 criminal cases related to Maoist activities, was taken to the premises of the Indo-Japanese company's corporate office at Panampilly Nagar by a police team led by ACP P Rajkumar. The police team comprised armed guards.
Moideen was questioned on Saturday night and Sunday morning before he was taken to the crime spot. Police sources said Moideen was the mastermind who orchestrated the attack on November 10, 2014. He had visited the office premises a few days before the incident.
Though he was in the city on the day of the attack, he did not go to the Nitta Gelatin premises. According to police sources, he reached the Ernakulam KSRTC bus stand in the morning and went to Manorama Junction at Panampilly Nagar by autorickshaw. There, he communicated with the gang assigned to carry out the attack. He left the city by 8 pm after confirming that the operation went as planned.
There are 11 accused, including nine directly involved in the crime. Five of them were earlier arrested. They are Jose from Kelakam, Kannur, Kasaragod natives Arun Balan and Sreekanth, Ramanan from Kollam and Anoop Mathew from Pathanamthitta.
The police got Moideen in custody for three days since Saturday. He will be produced before a court on Monday, the police said. He was handed over to the Kochi police, probing the Nitta Gelatin attack case, after the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) completed its evidence gathering in other cases.
The Maoist gang trespassed into the compound of Nitta Gelatine and vandalised the office and properties there and the windshield of a car parked outside. The group left Maoist pamphlets before leaving the place.
The CPI (Maoist) had taken responsibility for the attack, saying its urban action team under the Western Ghat Zonal Committee carried out the action. The ultra-left gang staged the attack, accusing the company of polluting the Chaliyar River and endangering the lives of the people on its banks.
Moideen, the Kerala in-charge of the CPI (Maoist), was nabbed by the ATS from Mararikulam in Alappuzha district while he was travelling on a KSRTC bus last month. He was arrested in a case lodged against him and three others for operating a banned organisation and going to Ambayathod junction in Kannur district with guns. A native of Malappuram district, 49-year-old Moideen absconded in 2014 after being accused in various cases.
He had lost his right hand while handling explosives during operations in Naxalbari, the police said. Moideen's brother C P Jaleel, who was also a CPI (Maoist) leader, was killed in an encounter with police in Vythiri, Wayanad district, in 2019. His two other brothers, C P Rasheed and C P Ismail are also accused in cases related to Maoist activities, police said.
