By PTI

NEW DELHI/JAIPUR: Security agencies including the NIA investigating the ‘heinous’ murder of a tailor in Udaipur will conduct an Internet Protocol Detail Records (IPDR) analysis of the phones used by the four defendants arrested in the case, officials said on Sunday.

They said it would help determine if there was a radicalization agenda run by the Karachi-based religious group Dawat-e-Islami.

One of the four defendants was linked to the JeI, according to the agencies.

Rajasthan police with the help of central security agencies arrested all four people so far for the murder of Kanhaiya Lal on June 28 in his tailor shop.

Riaz Akhtari’s horrific attack on the tailor was recorded on a phone by Ghouse Mohammad, and it was posted online.

They later said in a video that they hacked Lal to death with a cleaver in revenge for an alleged insult to Islam.

Apart from these two defendants, against whom the evidence is a self-shot video, security agencies have also arrested two others – Mohsin and Asif – who are believed to be part of the plot to spread terror among the general public.

Officials said an IPDR scan would be performed on their phones to check their internet activities.

The IPDR helps track the details of a call or message generated by a telephone device and includes information such as the number the call was made from, the destination port, the date and the start and end time.

This technology works with more proximity in a 2G environment.

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IDPR correlates mobile users with other users of encrypted messaging services to make explicit the call patterns implicit in that data, according to a research paper by IIT Professor Ranjan Bose, a computer science student at University of Maryland Adya V Joshi, who interned with the Delhi Police in 2017-2018, and senior IPS officer Madan Oberoi, currently the executive director of Interpol.

The research paper was submitted by the trio to the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the world’s leading professional organization with over 4 lakh members from 160 countries at its 4th International Conference on Collaboration and Internet Computing (CIC) in 2018.

IPDR analysis can also determine the number of times a mobile user has visited a particular website, in addition to calls and messages made using Internet telephony.

The investigative agencies also found several Pakistani numbers on their WhatsApp account and said one of the accused was part of the secret groups apparently for religious activities.

In one such group, it was alleged that Ghouse had been asked to do “something spectacular” to avenge the insult to Islam and officials believed this could be the turning point where the “barbaric act to kill the tailor could have been hatched.

They said Mohsin’s place was used to sharpen the cleaver used in the act, while Asif helped carry out the reconnaissance of the tailor’s shop.

The four are in the custody of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) until July 12.

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On June 29, the NIA had re-registered the case after taking it over to the Rajasthan police under the Anti-Terrorism Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

“The NIA re-entered a case under ICC Sections 452, 302, 153(A), 153(B), 295(A), and 34 and UA(P) Sections 16, 18, and 20. 1967 against the accused who conspired, planned and committed the heinous murder of Shri Kanhaiya Lal Telli on June 28, 2022 in Udaipur, Rajasthan,” the NIA Spokesperson said.

“The defendants had also released a video of the foul play on social media claiming responsibility for the murder in order to spread panic and strike terror among the masses across the country,” the spokesperson said.

The case was initially registered at Dhanmandi Police Station in Udaipur.