Rohini Court Blast: Police Arrest Senior DRDO Scientist For ‘Planting’ Explosive, Wanted To Kill Lawyer

A low-intensity explosion in a laptop bag took place at the Rohini court complex on December 9. No causality was reported in the incident.

File photo of the December 9 blast that occurred inside Rohini court. (Courtesy: ANI)

New Delhi: Police on Saturday informed that a senior DRDO scientist has been arrested for allegedly planting an improvised explosive device (IED) in a tiffin box with an intention to kill his neighbour in the Rohini district court blast that took place earlier this month, news agency PTI reported.

The IED triggered a low-intensity explosion in courtroom number 102 on December 9, leaving a person injured.

The accused, Bharat Bhushan Kataria (47), was arrested on Friday, police stated.

Delhi Police Commissioner Rakesh Asthana informed that Bharat Kataria, a senior scientist at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), entered the court premises at 9.33 am on the day of the incident with two bags and left one of those behind inside courtroom number 102. 

He had left the court premises at 10.35 am.

“On search, we recovered bomb-making material like shrapnels and other incriminating evidence from his house,” the Delhi Police Commissioner said, as reported by news agency ANI.

According to the police, the accused had planted the IED in a tiffin box and left the bag containing the tiffin box inside the courtroom as he wanted to kill his neighbour, who is a lawyer.

“Both the parties had lodged several cases against each other. They live in the same building. Prima facie, it seems that Kataria had a grudge against the lawyer,” PTI quoted a senior police officer as saying.

The lawyer lives on the ground floor of the building while the accused lives on the third floor. As per the police, five civil cases were filed by Bharat Kataria against the lawyer, while the latter had filed seven civil cases against the accused.

Teams from the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) and the National Security Guard (NSG) had visited the site of the blast and it was ascertained that the materials used in making the IED were easily available in the market.

However, the IED was not properly assembled due to which only the detonator exploded, police said.

It was informed that the details of around 1,000 cars that had entered the court premises on the day of the incident were checked and the CCTV footage obtained from the court was analysed by the investigating officers.

Meanwhile, the police have ruled out any terror angle in the matter, ANI reported.

(With Agency Inputs)