NIA, Chennai police bust suspected 'ISIS module' in Bengaluru, three arrested
BENGALURU: The Q-branch of the Chennai police and National Investigating Agency (NIA) have busted a suspected Islamic State (ISIS) terror module in Karnataka with the arrest of three suspects from Bengaluru. Interestingly, the Special Cell of the Delhi Police too arrested three terror suspects on Thursday after an encounter in the Wazirabad area of Delhi.
However, a senior NIA officer said that so far, no link has been established between those arrested by the Q-branch and those nabbed in Delhi.
The Q-branch was tracking three of the accused in the murder of Tiruvallur Hindu Munnani leader K P S Suresh Kumar alias Pondy Suresh in July 2014. The police had identified six accused in the case — Haneef Khan, Imran Khan, Mohammed Zaid, Abdul Shamim, Syed Ali Nawas and C Khaja Moideen — but three of them had allegedly fled the country using fake documents. However, the police had managed to arrest the three others. The trio was lodged at the Puzhal Central Prison in Chennai and were released on bail recently.
When they skipped a hearing before a Chennai court on December 15, 2019, the Q-branch took over the case from the district police. “They had inputs that the three had planned something big and had even established clues to indicate possible links with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). One of the accused was in Bengaluru and was also recruiting people to carry out their operations,” said a NIA source.
Meanwhile, the NIA found that they had purchased about 15 SIM cards. Tracking those SIM cards, the police zeroed in on one Aijaz Basha, a resident of Bengaluru who was working as a bus driver with a private travel firm.
Aijaz Basha used to ply the bus between Bengaluru and Mumbai and hence, the Q-branch police had informed the Karnataka and Maharashtra police too.
The NIA team then tracked Aijaz with the help of a vehicle registration number. This information was passed on to the Central Crime Branch (CCB), which located his residence. Through Aijaz, the Q-branch police found that the missing trio was holed up in a room in Gurappanapalya, Bengaluru, and had even planned to recruit more people to conduct some ‘operation’. However, details of what was being planned was not revealed by the police.
On Tuesday, the police swooped down on the room in Gurappanapalya and nabbed Mohammed Haneef Khan (29), Imran Khan (32) and Mohammed Zaid (24). They were later taken to Tamil Nadu. The police have recovered 89 rounds of bullets, three pistols, some bomb-making material and incriminating documents, a gripper-like instrument used to climb walls from them.
An informed source said, “It could be that there was some kind of terror plot planned for January 26. However, details will be known only after the accused are interrogated.” Meanwhile, the NIA and the police have been asked to be vigilant about similar sleeper modules as the Q-branch suspects that there may be more recruits spread across cities in Karnataka and Maharashtra.
However, Deputy Commissioner of Police (South-East) Isha Pant told TNIE that she did not have any information about the arrests.