NIA raids 10 Tamil Nadu places over suspected IS links

CHENNAI: In an operation that began early on Monday, National Investigation Agency (NIA) sleuths searched the houses of 10 men, of whom nine were arrested last year, for suspected links with Islamic State (IS) and forming a group called ‘shahadat (martyrdom) is our goal’. Sources said the NIA team seized several “incriminating” materials.
The nine accused were arrested from different parts of Tamil Nadu in April 2018 for raising funds to procure arms. While one man is absconding, the others were later released on bail. The NIA teams searched the houses of the accused in Muthupet in Tiruvarur district, Keelakkarai and Devipattinam in Ramanathapuram district, Lalpet in Cuddalore district and Salem district.
An NIA release said the teams seized three laptops, three hard disks, 16 mobile
phones, eight SIM cards, two pen drives, five memory cards and one card reader, two knives and several digital devices. The devices will be forensically examined for videos or content pointing to a link between IS modules based in India, particularly Tamil Nadu and Kerala, and any of the attackers behind the Easter Day bombings in Sri Lanka.
Accused conspired to help jailed terrorists escape, push IS ideology
Chennai: NIA had conducted similar raids on three radicalized youngsters from Kasaragod and Palakkad in April. One of the three men, who were allegedly in touch with members of an IS module who had earlier migrated to an IS-controlled territory in Afghanistan, was later arrested. Investigators are also looking for the suspects’ links with Zahran Hashim, one of the bombers in Sri Lanka.
Late last year, NIA in searches carried out in connection with ISIS Coimbatore module had found speeches of Zahran Hashim’s videos on the devices seized. This had led the agency to alert the intelligence agencies which further gathered inputs and got whiff of the IS-inspired plot to carry out terror attacks in Sri Lanka. The intelligence was shared with Sri Lankan authorities through three alerts, with the last one sent hours before the attacks.
In April-May2018, nineof the10 accusedin the Keelakkarai case were arrested on charges of hatching a conspiracy to cause communal disharmony and forming a terrorist gang raising funds, procuring arms and preparing to commit terror acts. While one man is absconding, the others were later released on bail. The agency said the 10 men from different parts of the state formed a WhatsApp group called ‘Shahadat is our goal’. They had conspired in Keelakkarai to procure arms and raise funds to wage an armed struggle, to facilitate the escape of terrorists from prisons and to propagate the IS ideology.
The Keelakarai police booked them under various sections of IPC, Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 and Arms act in April last year. They arrested nine of them, including the leader of the gang A Sheik Dawood, 32, from Periyapattinam in Ramanathapuram district. Police busted the terror gang when they detained a member of the gang, M Mohammed Rifas, 37, a Sri Lankan Tamil. Police stumbled upon the gang while investigating the attack on a BJP functionary in Ramanathapuram district.