NIA arrests seven more IS suspects in countrywide raid

The National Investigation Agency arrested seven more people for allegedly plotting a terrorist attack in a countrywide raid more from 12 locations in six different cities.

All the accused were reportedly recruited in the name of terrorist outfit Islamic State (IS) and were under surveillance for the past six-seven months, said a senior NIA official.

Those arrested on Saturday have been identified as Syed Mujahid (33), resident of Tumkur, Karnataka, Mohammad Aleem (20), Lucknow U.P.; Mohammed Obedullah Khan (33), Hyderabad; Abu Anas(24), Hyderabad; Asif Ali (21),Bengaluru; Muhammed Abdul Ahad (46), Bengaluru and Suhail Ahmed (23), Bengaluru.

On Friday, the NIA and state police had arrested six accused persons. One more person identified as Imran Khan Pathan alias Abu Hind from Aurangabad was detained on Saturday afternoon. NIA officials said investigations were on and he had not been arrested yet. His arrest would take the number of accused to 14 in the case.

While home ministry has refused to name IS, officials said they were being recruited by former Indian Mujahideen (IM) member Shafi Armar alias Yousuf, a key member of Ansar ul Tawhid (AuT), which has pledged allegiance to the terrorist outfit. The accused are being brought to Delhi where they will be subjected to sustained interrogation.

“These individuals were planning and making efforts to establish a channel of procurement of explosives, weapons, identify locations to organize training camps including training of fire arms, motivate new recruits to target police officers, foreigners in India and to carry out terrorist activities in various parts of India. All the arrested suspects were being brought to New Delhi for interrogation as preliminary enquiry showed that they were working on evolving a terror outfit with ideologies similar to IS,” a statement by NIA said.