The arrested individuals, all hailing from Pune, were taken into custody as the NIA teams conducted simultaneous searches in various cities. In Karnataka, the raids were underway at several locations, while in Maharashtra, the operation targeted areas in Pune, Thane Rural, Thane City, and Mira Bhayandar.

According to sources within the NIA, the investigation has uncovered a larger conspiracy with international connections, indicating the involvement of foreign-based ISIS handlers in the case. The agency believes that the arrested individuals were part of a complex network dedicated to propagating the extremist ideology of ISIS within India.

The investigation revealed that the network had taken an oath of allegiance, known as Bayath, to the self-styled Khalifa (leader) of ISIS. Moreover, the individuals were found to be involved in the fabrication of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). The agency suspects that the network had plans to carry out acts of terrorism on Indian soil.

The NIA’s operation underscores the seriousness with which security agencies are approaching the threat of terrorism and the efforts being made to dismantle such networks. The agency’s swift action in apprehending the individuals involved in this ISIS terror conspiracy will undoubtedly serve as a deterrent to others with similar intentions.

The NIA has been at the forefront of counterterrorism efforts in India, consistently working towards identifying and neutralizing threats posed by terrorist organizations. The agency’s focus on uncovering international connections and the involvement of foreign handlers in this case highlights the global nature of the ISIS threat and the need for international cooperation to combat terrorism effectively.

As the investigation progresses, the NIA is expected to gather further evidence and interrogate the arrested individuals to dismantle the entire network and bring all those involved to justice.

The training facility known as the Green Valley Academy, which was located in Manjeri, Kerala, and covered a sizable 10-hectare area, was run by the “Green Valley Foundation” (GVF). According to the investigation agency, the property was initially used by the National Development Front’s cadres before being amalgamated with the PFI.

An investigation by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) found that the PFI used this site to train its cadres, particularly those connected to their “Service Wing,” in the use of weapons, physical fitness, and explosives use and testing. Numerous “PFI Service Wing” personnel are said to have used the centre as a hiding after committing crimes, including murder.

The training facility was additionally used to indoctrinate radical and divisive ideological instruction into PFI’s trained operatives, cadres, and members in order to advance the organization’s social agenda and goals. The location held the PFI’s offices as well as those of its frontal, falsely educational organisations.

Five further PFI training facilities in Kerala, including Malabar House, Periyar Valley, Valluvanad House, Karunya Charitable Trust, and Trivandrum Education and Service Trust (TEST), have already been the target of NIA action. There are also an extra 12 offices attached, which are occasionally used by the leadership of the group to organise various criminal and terrorist acts, organise weapons and physical training, and spread ideology.

The PFI’s modus operandi, which entails running such training centres under the pretence of charity and educational trusts created by members or leaders of the organisation, has been revealed by the NIA’s investigations.

On March 17, 2023, the NIA filed a chargesheet in which it accused 59 people, including the PFI as a whole.

Five locations in Darbhanga, Bihar, were searched, as well as two each in Patna, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, and Surat, Gujarat. Digital gadgets, SIM cards, and papers were taken by the agency.

A First Information Report (FIR) was filed on July 14 of last year by the Bihar police, which led to the arrest of one Marghoob Ahmad Danish aka Tahir of Phulwarisharif in Patna. Eight days later, the NIA took over the investigation.

On January 6, Marghoob was charged under several sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and the Indian Penal Code. According to the NIA, the accused was discovered to be a part of the “Ghazwa-e-Hind module,” which sought to radicalise youth “for the establishment of Ghazwa-e-Hind over Indian territory.”

The accused, according to the NIA, was in charge of a WhatsApp group called “Ghazwa-e-Hind” that was started by a Zain, a Pakistani citizen. According to the report, he joined the group with the intention of setting up sleeper cells in the nation to carry out terrorist actions. He added several Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, and Yemeni nationals to the group.

The accused had established many “Ghazwa-e-Hind” social media groups on WhatsApp, Telegram, and BiP messengers. Additionally, he had established the “BDGhazwa E HindBD” WhatsApp group and invited Bangladeshis to join.

“…several suspects in the case were in contact with handlers stationed in Pakistan and were engaged in spreading the notion of ‘Ghazwa-e-Hind’. The NIA conducted raids today at the residences of these suspects in three States, according to the agency.

“The group was planning to undertake terrorist attacks at vital installations in India with an aim to kill innocent people and strike terror in their minds,” the country’s main counter-terrorism arm said in a statement.

Those arrested “were motivated to undertake attacks at multiple places” including the capital region.

Six of the militants were arrested in the eastern state of West Bengal and while three in the southern state of Kerala, the NIA said, adding the individuals were “associated with Pakistan sponsored module of Al-Qaeda.”

A spokesman for Pakistan’s foreign office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pakistan has often denied giving material support to militants.

India has stepped up an offensive against militants in the Muslim-majority region of Kashmir and elsewhere.

Last year, Indian forces killed the leader of an Al-Qaeda-affiliated militant group in Kashmir, triggering protests in parts of the disputed region.

In the latest raids, the NIA seized sharp weapons, domestically made firearms and locally fabricated body armor. The nine militants will be produced in court for police custody and further investigation, the agency said.

Habib claims the rocket launcher that the NIA talks of is actually a hydraulic jack used in trolleys.

A week before Christmas, men claiming to be municipal surveyors, fanned out across the Mullano Mohalla colony and neighboring areas in Amroha town in Uttar Pradesh. They took photographs of certain houses even as the local councillor said no such survey was commissioned.

Early on December 26, a team of NIA officers along with local police raided one of the houses ‘surveyed’ in Mullano Mohalla and arrested Mufti Suhail, the alleged mastermind of an Islamic State module. In a similar raid at the adjacent Qazi Zada colony, the agency arrested Suhail’s alleged associate, Mohammad Irshad, an autorickshaw driver.

According to the NIA, the two were arrested with eight others from Amroha, Hapur and Delhi’s Seelampur for allegedly being part of a self-appointed group called the Harkat-ul-Harb-e-Islam and affiliated to Islamic State. The NIA has claimed that the arrests stopped the group from carrying out a series of terror attacks and said they have recovered a huge cache of arms and explosives and even a rudimentary rocket launcher.

Suhail’s relatives and neighbours in Amroha say they barely knew him since he moved to the UP town a little more than a month ago. His house, a one room-kitchen unit which is part of a joint family property, is at the end of the labyrinthine Mullano Mohalla. Only his uncle’s family lives in Amroha after Suhail’s father moved to Delhi’s Jaffarabad almost 40 years ago.

Suhail’s cousin Mohammed Yahya, a sales tax officer, says, “The family came here once in a year or two, if there was a wedding or if someone died. We have hardly been in touch. For the past month or so, Suhail has been living here with his wife. He hardly interacted with us. We do not know what he was doing apart from renovating his room.”

And that’s the refrain in Mullano Mohalla. Neighbours say they barely knew him as he mostly stayed in Delhi. “In the past month that he has been here, he hardly interacted with anyone. He would not even exchange greetings while passing by,” said a neighbour not wishing to be identified.

After the arrests, the NIA had said Suhail taught in a madrasa in Amroha, something his relatives and several madrasas close by know nothing about. “He was here for just a month. It is unlikely he was going to teach in a madrasa. At least we did not know he was teaching here,” said Yahya.

In the adjacent Qazi Zada colony, Mohammed Irshad’s family is busy preparing for the marriage of their daughter, Irshad’s sister, even as they come to terms with his arrest. “He has been arrested just because he had Suhail’s mobile number on his phone. Nothing has been recovered from our house. As an autodriver myself, I can tell you several people keep our numbers to call during emergencies,” says Irshad’s elder brother Aurangzeb.

“In 2016 a case was registered by the UP Police under the Anti Cow Slaughter Act in which Irshad was also made an accused since he was the driver. I wonder if this has any link to it?” he says. Among the other key accused are brothers Saeed and Raees Ahmed, who both run separate welding shops around Amroha. On Thursday, both workshops were sealed. From these workshops, the NIA has claimed to have recovered most of the explosives (gunpowder, sulphur, potassium chlorate) and the rocket launcher.

Shopkeepers near Raees’s workshop say he used to “make and repair trolleys to carry sugarcane” and his family Thursday blocked the Dhanaura-Amroha road near their village to protest his arrest. His father, Habib claims the rocket launcher that the NIA talks of is actually a hydraulic jack used in trolleys.

“You can check in the village. Most trolleys have it. The NIA has confused it for rocket launcher,” he says at his home in Saidpur. Family members say that NIA officers searched Saeed’s shop and their house. “They collected everything in sacks and sealed them. Such hydraulic jacks are still lying in the shop that is now sealed. Someone should explain to them that sulphur is used in welding. The NIA has just collected scrap. No one was trying to make a bomb here,” says a relative.

About 50 km away in Vaith village of Hapur district, an Islamic preacher Saquib Ifthikhar was also arrested. His inconsolable mother Shaista says, “He was even scared of monkeys. How would he be part of such a crime. If I scolded him, he would begin to cry. He married just a year ago and has an eight-day-old baby.”

The son of an Imam at a mosque in Bulandhshahr, Saquib worked in mosques in Meerut and Dasna before shifting closer home after marriage. The NIA claims he helped Suhail procure the weapons. “He was a God-fearing boy. He just had a phone and tablet that the police have taken away. He had shut the tablet down, which was used by our daughters, saying it was not allowed in Islam. We do not even have his photograph since he considered it haram in Islam,” says Shaista.

Article first published on Indian Express.