KOCHI: A man accused of forcing a Gujarat-based woman to convert and attempting to sell her off to ISIS terrorists in Syria has been taken into custody by the NIA, an official of the agency said today.
"Muhammed Riyaz Rasheed was intercepted at the Chennai airport on his arrival from Jeddah and we are examining him at Chennai," the official of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) said here.
The development comes days after the NIA said it has registered a case against nine people hailing from Kerala and Bangalore for allegedly being involved in forcibly converting the 25-year-old woman, who hails from Pathanamthitta district of Kerala and is settled in Gujarat.
They have also been accused of involvement in attempting to sell her off to ISIS terrorists in Syria.
Rasheed, who also hails from Kerala, is the main accused in the case.
He is expected to be produced before the NIA special court here tomorrow after the agency records his arrest.
The Central government informed the Kerala High Court four days ago that the NIA has taken over the probe into the matter and registered a case against nine people.
The Centre has said that it suo motu entrusted the investigation into the case to NIA in view of the seriousness of the alleged offence.
The NIA has filed an FIR before the special court in Ernakulam here against the nine people under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.
The nine have also been charged under various IPC sections for offences, including rape, forgery and forced religious conversion, the Centre has said.
The Centre's response was filed in an affidavit over a petition by the woman seeking an NIA probe into her alleged forced religious conversion and attempt to traffic her to Syria after marriage.
Earlier in January, the Ernakulam Rural police had arrested two persons in connection with the case.
The woman, in her complaint to police, has alleged that Rasheed pretended to be in love with her when she was studying in Bengaluru in 2014 and forced her to convert to Islam and married her.
She has also accused Rasheed of luring her and taking objectionable pictures of her, besides illegally confining her.
After forging documents for a fake passport, he had taken her to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia in August last year and tried to take her to Syria to join Islamic State, she has said.
The woman has alleged that eight other persons had assisted Rasheed in committing the crime.