S P E C I A L I N V E S T I G A T I O N

RAJIV ASSASSINATION

The Inside StoryThe LTTE team which carried out the meticulously planned killing was put

together by Pirabhakaran in October 1990 in the forests of Jaffna.

By ANIRUDHYA MITRA in Madras

ONE month after the brutal assas-sination of former prime minister

Rajiv Gandhi, the crack specialinvestigation team (SIT) has managed toedge considerably closer to unravellingthe complex plot behind the shockingcrime that stunned the nation.

The exhaustive investigation pro-cess and interrogation of key suspectspicked up so far have established that theplot to kill Rajiv Gandhi was first

hatched in October 1990 deep in thejungles of Jaffna. The motive is nowunderstood to have been related to thepolitical tremors then emanating fromNew Delhi. The then prime minister V.P.Singh was battling for survival follow-ing a threat by the BJP to withdrawsupport to his minority National Frontgovernment. Across the Palk Straits, inthe forest hide-outs of Jaffna in north-eastern Sri Lanka, the LTTE leadershipmet for a crucial assessment of thesituation. The meeting decided that the

chances of Congress(I) president RajivGandhi returning to power were nowalmost certain. For the extremist orga-nisation struggling for Tamil Eelam, thismeant a possible re-induction of the IPKFin Sri Lanka and a certain crackdown onthe elaborate LTTE network establishedin Tamil Nadu.

Even before the National Front gov-ernment finally collapsed, the LTTE hadmade up its mind to prevent RajivGandhi from regaining power even if itrequired the ultimate deterrent—his

T H E C O N S P I R A T O R S PIRABHAKARANLTTE supremo.

0A0Y oUBnAMANf*AM 'W$LTTEidealogueHHSHArrange shelters f<>Fthe assassins.EHSEBNow back in $Jaffna. Wanted.

Trusted LTTE lieutenant 1EEEfl Prepare ̂ e inM|dras for communicationsartti finances, .E5E3 Reported killed lastweek in an encounter withth Sri Lankan

ttfl 1Key LTTE instructor andjjexplosive expert.E^TQ give logisticalsupport toihe assassins!

fc Arrested.

SHIVARASAN(One-eyed Jack)LTTEintelligence squadCHSlWas given themost important task - thatof the assassination.

Most wanted.

Recruited byBabyCHS Shelteredthe assassins.ES3S1 Arrested.

BHAGYANATH&DK activist.EHH Shelteredthe assassins,

ation.i Died in

RAVI SHAN KARPhotographer &LJTEsupporter.CH3 Filmedthe dry runs.BS2ES Underinterrogation.

ARIVULTTE activist &explosives expertEfflEBMadethebomb that killedRaiyGandhi.BnrTEgArrested.

harboured HShivarasan. 'KBfcM&HArresteH

LTTE 'Shadow'stMd member.ijl The human

SHUBHALTTE'Shadow'squad member.liBEB Standbyfor Dhanu.

assassination.IfiS® Killed inpthe blast,

22 INDIA TODAY » JULY 15. 1991

GRENADES,CONTAININGC4-RDXEXPLOSIVE

9 VOLTBATTERY

assassination. By earlyNovember 1990, the V.PSingh government wasvoted out and Rajiv Gan-dhi was virtually back inpower, shooting from be-hind Chandra Shekhar'sshoulder. The possibilityof a mid-term poll loomedever larger. The LITE wasgetting desperate.

Realising that Rajiv asprime minister would be anear-impossible target, itwas decided that theyshould strike while his se-curity status was still thatof an opposition leaderand election campaigningwould render him evenmore vulnerable. In end-November, the elusiveLITE supremo Pirabha-karan, having decided onthe physical eliminationof Rajiv Gandhi, sum-moned four trusted lieu-tenants—Baby Subra-maniyam, Murugan,Muthuraja and Shiva-rasan—to finalise thecontours of an assassina-tion plot. Subramaniyamand Muthuraj a were sum-moned from Madraswhere they were stayingat the time.

In the first week ofDecember, Pirabhakaranmade his decision known to the fourmembers of the team he had summoned.The actual details of the operation wereleft to them but each was assigned aspecific task.

>• Baby Subramaniyam, a prominentideologue of the LITE, was operatingfrom Madras running a printing presspublishing LITE literature. His task wasto prepare a back-up team that wouldarrange shelter for the assassins beforeand after the killing.

>• Muthuraja was asked to prepare abase in Madras to ensure proper com-munication facilities, couriers for mes-sages and the smooth distribution ofmoney for the assassins.

>• Murugan, a key instructor and anexplosive expert of the LTTE, was asked totake over the assignments from Subra-maniyam and Muthuraja after theirdeparture for Jaffna.^ Shivarasan, the much wanted man

today, who has been labeled "one-eyed-Jack" was given the most importanttask—the actual assassination.

The assassination plot received fur-

TOGGLESWITCHES

The denim jacket put together from pieces at the blast-site

ther impetus with the dismissal of theDMK government led by M. Karunanidhiin Tamil Nadu. Karunanidhi's govern-ment was dismissed on grounds ofhaving encouraged the LTTE movementin the state—not entirely baselessas Karunanidhi on his campaign trail,before the assassination, portrayed thefellow Tamils' cause in Sri Lanka asjust and noble.

IMPOSITION of Central rule in TamilNadu was a major setback for theLTTE. The decision to dissolve the DMK

government—though essentially politi-cal and under tremendous pressurefrom the Congress(I) and the AIADMK—was taken following a series of reportsfiled by the' Intelligence Bureau (IB)revealing the -growing informal rela-tionship between the followers of theDMK and the LTTE.

But even though the IB had estab-lished Karunanidhi's sympathy to-wards the LTTE and its links with theDMK, it was utterly in the dark regardingthe extremist group's plan to liquidate

Rajiv Gandhi. The exter-nal intelligence organisa-tion, Research and Analy-sis Wing (RAW), wasequally clueless about theexistence of the plot.

Meanwhile, by the be-ginning of 1991, the fourlieutenants of Pirabha-karan had already set theplan in motion. BabySubramaniyam andMuthuraja were back inMadras. Both were en-gaged in the crucial firststage of the plot—identi-fying and recruiting localpeople who would even-tually harbour the assas-sination squad.

A key recruiting cen-tre was a photo agencywhich had developed intoan LTTE hub in Madras.Shubha News and PhotoAgency was run byShubha Sundaram who isconsidered to be a godfa-ther for most of the bud-ding photographers inMadras. Shubha's agencywas visited by manyDravida Kazhagam (DK)members also. The DK.which is an extremist sib-ling of the DMK, has beenopenly sympathetic to-wards the LTTE.

Muthuraja and BabySubramaniyam picked their first tar-get—Bhagynathan—a young DK activ-ist from Shubha's place. Bhagynathanhad expressed ambitions of bringing outa political journal but lacked the finan-cial resources. Bhagynathan's familywas heavily steeped in debt and hadmeagre means of support. He himselfmanaged to earn a living by supplyingstationery items to a firm where hissister, Nalini, was employed as a secre-tary. His mother, a nurse, was workingin Kalyani Nursing Home.

The crunch came when his motherwas asked to vacate the quarter pro-vided by the nursing home authorities.The family was desperate, lack of moneymeant they could not afford to rent aplace to live in Madras. The first recruitfor the assassination plot had fallen intothe LTTE'S lap. Baby Subramaniyamcasually mentioned to Bhagynathanthat he was looking for a customerfor his printing press as he was think-ing of switching to another business.Bhagynathan offered to take over thepress provided the price was paid in

* I N D I A TODAY 23

S P E C I A L I N V E S T I G A T I O N

instalments. Seeing Bhagynathan fall-ing into the trap, Baby readily agreed. Hesold the press to Bhagynathan at aridiculously low price of Rs 5,000, pay-able in small instalments.

Baby now had also gained access toBhagynathan's entire family which hadshifted to the area where the press waslocated. He advised Nalini to helpBhagynathan in his new venture afterher normal office hours. The presspremises, in any event, offered the per-fect cover for a suitable hide-out. Thesecond stage of the operation—recruit-ing the entire family—had begun.Baby's strategy of convincing Nalini tohelp Bhagynathan run the press wasstarting to pay off. Nalini was exposed tothe LTTE literature which was then beingchurned out and conveyed one keymessage: Rajiv Gandhi was solely re-sponsible for the "crimes" perpetratedby the IPKF in Sri Lanka.

Nalini was easy to recruit. She wassoon working on a book titled SatanicForces and sub-titled Heinous Crimes ofthe Indian Peace Keeping Force. Thebook carried no comment from the LTTEexcept one innocuous message fromPirabhakaran: "Work is worship." Thebook itself was merely a compilation ofsundry news reports, photographs, car-toons and editorials published in theIndian media about the negative aspectsof the IPKF in Sri Lanka and the mishan-dling of the situation by Rajiv Gandhi'sgovernment.

Meanwhile, the second member ofthe recruiting team, Muthuraja, hadbeen equally busy in Shubha Sunda-ram's agency. Shubha had already re-ceived a message from Pirabhakaran tocooperate with Muthuraja in a secretoperation of the LTTE for which recruit-ment of some unknown faces was neces-sary. Two young photographers, RaviShankaran and Haribabu, fitted therequirements. Even though Shubha had

fired Haribabu for being inattentive, hewas deeply indebted to the LTTE for thefinancial support they had given him forphotographic assignments. Haribabuhad joined a new agency, VigneshwarVideo, but was well aware that themoney being paid to him was muchmore than the normal assignment fee.

This was when Muthuraja informedHaribabu that someone who needed tobe trained in photography was arrivingfrom Jaffna and would stay withHaribabu as a paying guest. The newentrant in Haribabu's life, Balan, didmuch more than allow Haribabu to earnsome extra money. He gradually brain-washed the young photographer intobelieving that Rajiv Gandhi was solelyresponsible for the brutality inflicted onthe Sri Lankan Tamils and that hisreturn to power would mean yet an-other bout of atrocities.

BACK in Jaffna, Murugan was pre-paring to make his entry onto thestage that had been set by his two

accomplices in Madras. The plot wasproceeding satisfactorily and accordingto schedule. After a series of meetingswith Shivarasan in Jaffna, Murugandecided to send two young LTTE boysfrom Shivarasan's village, Jaykumaranand Robert Pias, to Madras. They ar-rived in early February. Initially theystayed at Jaykumaran's brother-in-lawArivu Perulibalan's house at SavriNagar Extension in Porur, a suburb ofMadras. Arivu, a diploma holder incomputer science, had been living inMadras since early 1990. Although adedicated member of the LTTE, he hadplayed no active role in its subterraneanactivities till he was approached byMurugan. Arivu's electronic expertisewas to be of deadly significance.

Murugan entered the scene in mid-February when he arrived in Madras.His first move was to shift Pias and

Haribabu's camera (circled)

Jaykumaran to new accommodationwith the help of Arivu who had been toldabout the "special mission" withoutdisclosing the target. Murugan's pri-mary task was to give logistical supportapart from providing sufficient financialsupport to all three. By shifting Pias andJaykumaran to a new residence, he had

JANUARY 1991Baby Subramaniyam traps

Bhagynathan'sfamiiy by selling them his printing press.The household becomes a shelter for the assassins.

In Jaffna, LTTE supremo Pirabhakaran summons fourtrusted lieutenants and informs them that Rajiv Gandhi'sreturn as PM is inevitable and so he must be eliminated.

24 I N D I A TODAY * JULY 15, 1991

which contained the crucial film that recorded the fateful moments

also provided another hide-out for theteam. Pias and Arivu were told toorganise a fake licence for a two-wheeler.

In end-February, Muthuraja intro-duced Murugan to Bhagynathan's fam-ily. By then, Nalini had developed a deepsense of hatred for Rajiv G andhi at a time

when his return to power was becomingimminent. Murugan thus had no prob-lem in finalising the third hide-out. Withthree safe shelters, an electronic expertin Arivu who had been asked to impro-vise a bomb out of grenades that could bedetonated by a suicide bomber, threeconverts in Nalini, Padma and Bhagy-

nathan, and a recruiter in ShubhaSundaram, the plot was in place.Murugan sent a message to Shivarasanin Jaffna asking him to come to Madras.Shivarasan arrived in the first week ofMarch. He first stayed at Pias' house inPorur where he was given a detailedbriefing on the shelters and the peoplewho had been recruited by Muthurajaand Baby Subramaniyam.

SHIVARASAN'S arrival in Madrascompleted the elaborate web spunby Pirabhakaran in the jungles of

Jaffna for the execution of Rajiv Gandhi.From now on, the key role in the plotwould be played by Shivarasan. Every-thing was working to plan. Shivarasan,himself an expert on explosives, exam-ined Arivu's design for a human bomband pronounced it suitable. He askedBaby Subramaniyam and Muthuraja toleave for Sri Lanka as it would not be safefor them to live in India any longer. Bythe end of March, Muthuraja and BabySubramaniyam left for Jaffna.

Shivarasan moved to the Bhagyna-than household where he discussed theplan with Murugan, Nalini andBhagynathan. He told them that he hadsomebody in mind who would act as thehuman-bomb. He also askedBhagynathan to look for a photogra-pher who could be trusted. However, thetarget was still kept secret. RaviShankaran and Haribabu, old-timefriends, were then brought into thepicture. Sensing that they were beinginvolved in a specific operation of theLTTE, both realised that they hadreached a point of no-return.

The next step was to prove the mostfateful—Shivarasan returned to Jaffnato bring back his human-bomb. InJaffna, he met Pirabhakaran and briefedhim on the progress that had taken placein Madras. Pirabhakaran askedShivarasan to make sure that they un-

FEBRUARY 1991An explosive expert of the

LTTE, Murugan discusses the design of the bombrequired with Arivu at the iatter's Porur house.

The second LTTE recruiter, Muthuraja, cultivates two freelance photographers, Haribabu and Ravi Shankaran whowill film the actual assassination.

J U L Y 15, 1991 » I N D I A TODAY 25

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dertake dry-runs before the actual oper-ation and ordered that the whole exer-cise be photographed for his viewing.

Shivarasan then selected his humanbombs—Dhanu alias Gayatri andShubha alias Shalini, two women mem-bers of the LITE'S shadow squad. Inci-dentally, both the girls happened to behis cousins. He was back in Madraswithin a week with the two girls in tow.The next step was to procure the explo-sives (C4 variety of RDX), the sameyellow-coloured plastic explosives hehad used to kill the EPRLF leader J.Padmanabha. With the LITE'S vast net-work in Tamil Nadu, obtaining theexplosive was the least of the problems.Shivarasan was now all set to carry outhis leader's orders—the assassination ofRajiv Gandhi.

In Madras, Dhanu and Shubha hadbeen taken to Nalini's house whereMurugan was awaiting them. Shiva-rasan kept the others—Pias, Jaykuma-ran and Arivu—away from the plan-ning sessions which were to follow. Butin a separate meeting, Shivarasan ex-plained to Arivu the specifics of thebomb he required. Without disclosingthe operation in detail, he asked for abomb that could be easily hidden be-neath the clothes and fitted around thewaist of a female person.

Arivu got down to work and cameup with an ingenious design for a belt-bomb. Six grenades could be fitted in aseries on the belt. Each grenade would bemade up of 80 gm of the C4 RDX (2,800splinters of 2.0 mm each) enclosed with-in a casing of TNT. The grenades wereconnected in parallel with silver wiresand the circuit was completed with twotoggle switches, one for arming and theother for triggering the bomb. The de-vice was charged with a 9 mm battery.

After approving the bomb, Shiva-rasan instructed Murugan to find atailor to stitch the vest. Murugan found

a local tailor and had the vest made ofblue denim, a fabric heavy enough tosupport the one-kilo bomb. Once thevest was ready, Arivu carefully fixed thebomb onto the vest. The weapon thatwould reduce Rajiv Gandhi and at least16 others to a mangled heap was nowready to be put to use .

W ITH this, Shivarasan was•eady to stage the dry-runsrdered by Pirabhakaran. The

first dry-run took place on April 18 at thefavourite spot for political rallies—Ma-rina Beach in Madras. Marina Beachwas the venue for Rajiv Gandhi's firstcampaign meeting in Tamil Naduwhich was also addressed by the AI ADMKleader Jayalalitha. The meeting wasphotographed by Ravi Shankaran whileShubha Sundaram's agency took avideo recording. However, the potentialassassins did not attempt to get too closeto the two leaders. Incidentally,Haribabu, who was present at the trialrun along with Ravi Shankaran, had hisfirst inkling that the target was going tobe a politician.

The next dry-run was executed onMay 12 at a meeting featuring V.P.Singh and Karunanidhi at Thiruvallurin Arkonam, 40 km away from Madras.This time, the exercise was more fruitfulas Dhanu was able to touch the feet ofV.P. Singh in much the same manner asshe would do with Rajiv Gandhi on thefateful night of May 21. This session wasalso shot on video by the Shubha PhotoAgency. The video film is now in posses-sion of the investigating team.

Following two successful rehears-als, Shivarasan now looked for the rightopportunity for the actual assassina-tion . Time was running out. The May 21meeting at Sriperumbudur was an-nounced two days in advance and itprovided the best—and the last—oppor-tunity. On the morning of May 20,

Seconds after the fatal blast,

Shivarasan reached Nalini's house witha newspaper clipping which detailedRajiv's public meetings on May 21 end-ing at Sriperumbudur that night. Thevenue was decided.

Ravi Shankaran called Haribabuand asked him to purchase the garlandand then meet Shivarasan and others at

APRIL 1991Shivarasan returns to Tamil

Nadu with human bombs Dhanu and Shubha, womenTigers of the shadow squad.

Shivarasan returns to Jaffna to brief Pirabhakaran whoorders dry-runs before the actual execution and theexercise to be photographed for his viewing.

26

fire can be seen smouldering at Rajiv's feet

Nalini's house on the afternoon of May21. Haribabu then asked RaviShankaran to get him a camera alongwith a film roll. Ravi Shankaran, insteadof giving Haribabu one of his owncameras, borrowed one from a friendDeepak, and gave it to Haribabu alongwith a Konika colour roll.

The night of May 20 was spent in arelaxed mood. The conspiratorswatched a film. None of the girls, par-ticularly Dhanu, showed any sign ofnervousness. Shubha tried out thedenim vest on Dhanu. She also'tried onthe spectacles she would wear for dis-guise for the first time. The next day at

4.30 p.m., Nalini, Shubha, Dhanu andShivarasan left for Parry's Corner fortheir rendezvous with Haribabu.

At Parry's Corner, near the main busstand of Madras city, Haribabu waswaiting with the sandalwood garlandwhich he had bought an hour earlierfrom the state emporium Poompuhar.The five conspirators boarded a bus forSriperumbudur where they reachedaround 8 o'clock in the evening.

ALL five, with Dhanu holding the/•\, positioned themselves

JL JL around the VIP enclosure. Atone point, they were questioned by awoman sub-inspector on duty, AnsuyaKumari. Haribabu said he was a presscameraman and was there to take thephotograph of the girl (Dhanu) garland-ing Rajiv Gandhi. The sub-inspectortold them that Rajiv was coming muchlater and hence there was no need forthem to be around so early and thephotographer should go to the pressenclosure. They moved away. Shubhaand Nalini sat in the crowd. Shivarasantook his position near the dais. Hecarried a pistol as he was the lonemember of the back-up team. Dhanuand Haribabu stood close to the redcarpet on which Rajiv would walk on hisway to the dais.

Rajiv arrived at around 10 p.m. andwas immediately surrounded by peopletrying to garland him. The sub-inspec-tor, Ansuya, once again tried to preventDhanu from getting close to Rajiv. Shehad almost caught hold of the assassinbut for Rajiv Gandhi, who, according toAnsuya, said: "Let everybody get achance." Ansuya moved away—thussaving her own life. Dhanu bent down asif she wanted to touch Rajiv's feet. Rajivin turn bent to lift her up. Dhanu's rightfinger activated the bomb.

Soon after the blast, Nalini andShubha walked towards the bus stand

APRIL 1991 APRIL 1991The dry-run at Rajiv's Marina

Beach rally. Dhanu gets closer to the dais thanShivarasan. Clicked by Ravi Shankaran and Haribabu.

Shivarasan, himself an explosives expert, examinesArivu's design of how the bomb will work before pronounc-ing it suitable.

J U L Y 15, 1991 » I N D I A TODAY 27

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where they were to meet Shivarasanwho told them that Rajiv Gandhi,Dhanu and Haribabu were dead andthey better make a getaway. They tookan auto-rickshaw till Poonamali fromwhere they took another to reachShivarasan's Porur house. Shivarasanrang up Shubha Sundaram and told himthat though Haribabu had died in theblast, his camera was intact andSundaram should try and recover it.

But because of the disturbance in thecity, they were confined to the house allthrough the day. On the night of May21, Sundaram swung into action. Herang up the house of a photographer, T.Ramamurthy, and was told that Rama-murthy had called from the Poonamalipolice station to say that he was slightlyinjured in the blast and would take sometime to reach home. Sundaram thenrang up the Poonamali police stationand asked Ramamurthy if he hadbrought the camera from Haribabu.Ramamurthy told him that was' 'not hisjob". Meanwhile, Sundaram had in-formed Ravi Shankaran about the ne-cessity of recovering Haribabu's cameraand the crucial film roll.

By then, the SIT had launched itsmassive investigation. Officials had vis-ited the Madras General Hospital to getan eyewitness account from the victims.Ansuya gave them a description of some"suspicious characters" she had seenroaming around with a photographer.By then, the photographs taken byHaribabuhadbeen developed. Ansuya'saccount had made them suspiciousabout certain characters featured in thepictures including that of the womanholding a sandalwood garland alongwith Shivarasan. Next day, Ansuyaconfirmed that they were the samepeople she had spotted.

The next morning, the SIT visited thescene of crime where they found parts ofDhanu's dress, strips of the vest and the

belt-bomb she wore withpieces of flesh attached,two toggle switches, wiresused in the bomb and ahalf-burnt 9-volt battery.The experts carried outDNA printing of the piecesof flesh found at the spot.The flesh piece attached tothe belt matched with theportion of the woman'sbody found. That estab-lished convincingly thetheory of the assassin be-ing a human-bomb.

NEXT, the bomb ex-perts of the Na-tional Security

Guards reconstructed thedenim vest and part of thebelt. Meanwhile, on May25, the arrest of an LTTEmember, Shankar, atVedaraniam port, pro-vided another break-through. Shankar, whenintercepted, told thelocal police that he hadbeen sent to India by Pira-bhakaran in order to killVaradaraja Perumal whohas been given refuge bythe Indian Government inBhopal.

The matter was imme-diately brought to the no-tice of the SIT in Madras.Shankar, when shownthe pictures taken by Haribabu, identi-fied the kurta-pyjama clad man in thephotographs as Raghuvaran, an explo-sive expert and a trusted lieutenant ofPirabhakaran who was involved in thekilling of EPRLF leader Padmanabha. Ofthe several LTTE activists andsympathisers rounded up for interroga-tion, one Jagdishan from Vedaraniam

Arivu (left) who designed the bomb

also identified the kurta-pyjama cladman as Raghu adding that he hadtravelled during the Padmanabha kill-ing in his speedboat between Veda-raniam and Point Pedro of Jaffna.

A notebook recovered fromShankaran's possession carried a Ma-dras telephone number with two names:Nalini and Murugan. The telephone

MAY 1991 MAY 1991At Nalini's house Shubha

helps Dhanu try on the denim jacket with the bomb. Thebomb would be undetectable under her salwar-kameez.

The second dry-run at the V.P. Singh rally in Thiruvallur.Dhanu is able to touch Singh's feet in much the samemanner as she would with Rajiv Gandhi.

28

looking for Haribabu'scamera. Haribabu'smother, Laxmi, told theSIT that Ravi Shankaranhad visited their house onMay 22 morning to in-quire about the camerabut never told them abouthis death. Another friendofHaribabu, Kannan, alsotold the SIT the same story.This led the SIT to tap thephones of the two photog-raphers. Both were putunder surveillance.

T:

and Pias were crucial links in the plot

authorities confirmed the identity of theholders of the number.

Meanwhile, a study of Padma-nabha's killing revealed that the twounexploded grenades found from thespot contained C4 RDX explosives. TheSIT also received a tip-off about twophotographers, Shubha Sundaram andRavi Shankaran, who were desperately

HE SIT officials vis-ited Sriperumbuduragain with the pic-

tures shot by Haribabu ofthe crowd which was cir-culated among the localpopulation. Through apainstaking process ofelimination, only four orfive characters were leftunidentified and two ofthem turned out to beShubha and Nalini.

A study of the photoalbum seized from RaviShankaran also showedNalini along with a fewothers. During question-ing, Ravi Shankaran toldthe SIT that he knew one of

'the characters in the pho-tograph from his album. Itturned out to be Nalini's

brother, Bhagynathan.Bhagynathan was picked up from

his printing press but Nalini andMurugan managed to flee. Bhagy-nathan told the SIT how he came underthe influence of Baby Subramaniyamand about the operatives he had har-boured. He identified the mysteriouskurta-pyjama clad man as Shivarasan.

Working round the clock, the SIT hadmanaged to establish the identities of thekurta-pyjama clad man, the actual as-sassin, her accomplices Shubha,Murugan and Nalini. Further interroga-tion of Bhagynathan, Shubha Sunda-ram and Ravi Shankaran revealed moredetails of the plot.

While this was going on, Muruganand Nalini were in Tirupati where heplanned to shave his head to celebratethe success of the operation. They alsoplanned to get married. But by now,Nalini's photograph had been splashedall over the state so they gave up theidea. Presuming the coastal areas wouldbe heavily patrolled, both of them de-cided to return to Madras.

They were unaware that scores ofpolice teams were waiting for them at allthe railway and bus stations in Madras.The arrest of Murugan and Nalini wasthe biggest breakthrough in the investi-gation. Their interrogation not onlyrevealed the entire plot but also pointeda conclusive finger at Pirabhakaran asthe mastermind. Murugan admittedthat he had direct orders fromPirabhakaran. With their confession,the arrests of Arivu and Robert Piasquickly followed.

But despite the successes notched upso far, SIT chief D.R. Karthikeyan stillfeels that "there is a long way to go". Ashe told INDIA TODAY: "We are yet to catchthe main culprit (now popularly knownas one-eyed-Jack because of his oneglass eye) which might help us stretchthe arm of law deep inside the forest ofJaffna. I am not jumping to any conclu-sion about the motive or conspiracybehind the crime. But we have solved,how the assassination was executed. Imust say that my colleagues have beendoing a remarkable job." Judging by thechilling and detailed reconstruction ofthe plot to kill Rajiv Gandhi, that isclearly no idle boast.

MAY 1991Dhanu garlands Rajiv and

then bends down to touch his feet. As he in turn bends toraise her up, she triggers the bomb.

Ansuya, a sub-inspector, tries to prevent Dhanu fromgetting too close to Rajiv but is prevented by Rajiv himselfwho says: "Let everybody get a chance."

5. 1991 * I N D I A TODAY 29