K. Krishnakumar (39), the former militant of the proscribed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) arrested by the police in Ramanathapuram on July 20 turned out to be a hard nut to crack and the ‘Q’ Branch police could arrest only one person, a Sri Lankan Tamil who had offered financial assistance to him in the aftermath of his arrest, police sources said.

After the special branch team arrested him on the night of July 20 and remanded him in judicial custody, the Q branch police took his custody for four days but could not obtain any valuable information about the possible regrouping of those who had served in LTTE and whether they were trying to revive the movement after it was defeated by the Lankan forces in the civil war in 2009.

True to the nature of a hardcore militant, he was a hard nut to crack, the sources said adding he pleaded ignorance of any network operating in Tamil Nadu. “If we posed four questions, he would answer one, that too very vaguely,” the sources said.

Krishnakumar was arrested at the coastal Uchipuli when he came down from Madurai to take a clandestine boat ride to cross over to Talaimannar.

He was carrying 75 cyanide capsules, 300 gm of cyanide power, four Global Positioning System (GPS) and seven mobile phones.

He had served in the LTTE in the 1990s and came to Tamil Nadu through a valid passport in 2009, police said.

Someone in Madurai had handed over the cyanide capsules and the gadgets to be taken to Talaimannar and he would not know beyond that, he told the police during interrogation. The then Q branch Superintendent of Police K. Bhuvaneeshwari also tried her best during the interrogation, the sources added.

Based on his information, Q branch police had arrested one V. Subaskaran (39), a Lankan Tamil in Chennai but could not make further headway after the arrest, the sources said.

He was residing in Chennai with his family for about six years and used to receive money from foreign sources.

He had given money to Krishnakumar through a person, the sources added. He was working as a security in a private company and now lodged in Puzhal central prison.

N. Rajendran (44), the local Tamil who had brought Krishnakumar in a car from the Mattuthavani bus stand in Madurai for the illegal ferrying had never met him before.

He was waiting at the bus stand and the former militant came near his car after calling him over phone, the sources said.

Source: The Hindu