The two men accused of storming the Lok Sabha on Wednesday have said during interrogation their objective was to raise the issues of unemployment and the Manipur situation in front of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a police investigator told The Telegraph.

“Both D. Manoranjan and Sagar Sharma told us during interrogation that they had thought that raising the two important issues in front of Modi would attract enough attention and force the government to act,” the officer said.

Modi was, however, not present in Parliament when Manoranjan and Sagar jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the visitors’ gallery and released yellow smoke from canisters as MPs watched horrified.

Sources said Manoranjan and Sagar carried English pamphlets on the ethnic violence in Manipur and on unemployment. Another pamphlet had “Jai Hind” written in English and carried a picture of a closed fist.

“They also had a pamphlet calling the Prime Minister a ‘missing person’ and announcing that a cash reward from a Swiss bank was on offer,” another officer said.

While Manoranjan and Sagar stormed the Lok Sabha, their associates Neelam Azad and Amol Shinde sprayed coloured gas from canisters just outside Parliament while shouting slogans against “tanashahi (diactatorship)”.

All four have been booked under the anti-terror law UAPA — apart from Indian Penal Code provisions — although police sources have said they are yet to find any association between the accused and any terror group. The quartet are in police remand.

A Delhi court on Friday remanded Lalit Jha, said to be the mastermind behind the “conspiracy”, to seven days’ police custody. Jha, a Calcutta resident and teacher by profession, had surrendered at Parliament Street police station late on Thursday night.

Canisters in soles

Police sources said Manoranjan and Sagar had hidden the canisters in cavities cut into the soles of their custom-made sports shoes that were supported by thick rubber layers.

An officer at Parliament Street police station said the cavities had been cut into the left soles of the shoes worn by Manoranjan and Sagar.

“Sagar told us the shoes had been manufactured by a shop in Lucknow. A police team will leave for Lucknow soon to question the shop-owner. The shoes are now part of forensic inquiries,” he said.

Sagar is from Lucknow.

The police had sought Lalit’s remand for 15 days, telling the court that he needed to be interrogated to unearth the “larger conspiracy”.

“We need to confront the accused with each other to track the financial transactions and funding behind the attack, and also to ascertain whether the accused had any association with any enemy country or terror group,” the police told the court.

Investigators are questioning two other people, one of whom works for an NGO, as they had allegedly been in touch with Jha after the incident.