Search has been intensified for three more suspects in the parallel telephone exchange case subsequent to the arrest of the prime accused P. P. Shabeer after a year-long investigation into the incident. The support of police squads from various other States will also be sought.
Though the police, with the support of the hi-tech cell, had previously tried their best to track the suspects, it failed to work out as expected. The three — M.G. Krishnaprasad, Abdul Gafoor, and K. Niyas — were at large after eight parallel telephone exchanges were exposed in Kozhikode by the police on July 2, 2021. Look out notices too had failed to attract any reliable leads about their hideouts. The possibility of their escape to foreign countries was also under investigation.
In the wake of the latest arrest, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) under the District Crime Branch (CB) is likely to exchange the case details with the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) to probe in detail the suspected use of the discreet telephone network for anti-national activities. NIA and ED officers are likely to quiz the prime accused along with a few others who were previously arrested on charges of running similar parallel telephone exchanges in Malappuram and Bengaluru.
