NIA arrests woman media student, gym operator from Pune in IS case

PUNE: The mother of the 22-year-old woman — arrested on Sunday by a National Investigation Agency (NIA) team with another man from Pune in connection with the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) case registered by the Delhi police in March — claimed that their family had no idea as to what for and on what grounds her daughter had been arrested.
Besides the woman, a second-year journalism student, the NIA arrested a 27-year-old gym operator from a gated housing society in Kondhwa in the same case that started with the Delhi police arresting a Kashmiri couple from Jamianagar, Okhla Vihar, in March.

In 2015, the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) had questioned and deradicalised the same woman, then a minor, after she was suspected of being in contact with ISIS recruiters through social media. Again, in 2018, the Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) police had detained her for an alleged terror plot but released her later.
“She had gone to J&K for securing an admission to a nursing course. The police questioned her but found nothing and released her,” her mother said.
She said, “On Sunday afternoon, they (NIA) came to our home (a two-storey joint family set-up at Phulenagar in Yerawada), started questioning my daughter and took her to the Yerawada police station stating that they wanted to further question her.
NIA sleuths arrest duo from city in IS case
Around 8.45pm, they called me to say they had arrested her, but did not clarify why and for what. They should have explained to us the grounds for her arrest. I am sure my daughter is innocent.”
It is the NIA’s case that the woman was continuously in touch with the Kashmiri couple — who have an affiliation with the ISKP as well as an ISIS Abu Dabhi module member lodged in Tihar jail — on various secure messaging applications and deliberating on how to propagate the ISIS ideology and further its activities in India by recruiting youths for terrorist activities.
“The Kondhwa man was also actively involved with the Kashmiri couple in planning terror attacks in India by arranging logistic support such as procurement of weapons, fake SIM cards and the assembling of improvised explosive devices to further ISIS activities in India,” an NIA official said.
The two were flown to Delhi on Monday and would be produced before a special NIA court there for custodial remand and further investigation, the official said.
The man’s family is in shock. One of his relatives told TOI, “We never had any reason to suspect him as he lived a normal family life. His wife is a homemaker and he has an 18-month-old son, besides parents and two brothers. We have no information about his association with ISIS or any terrorist outfits. The NIA officials came, conducted some searches and checked all of our cellphones. They then visited his office at Kausarbaug and took him to the Kondhwa police station for futher investigation. Around 8pm, they informed us about his arrest.”