KOCHI: Ansar-ul-Khilafah Kerala, the Islamic State (IS) linked group that was busted by security agencies while conducting a clandestine meeting at Kanakamala in Kannur, was planning to attack RSS leaders in Kozhikode to announce its reach in 2016, said National Investigation Agency (NIA) during the prosecution argument being held at the NIA Court in Kochi on Thursday.
NIA prosecutor Arjun Ambalapatta produced the group’s activities on Facebook and Telegram as evidence to substantiate the prosecution’s argument.
Members of a Facebook page named Ansar formed six separate groups on Telegram to discuss Jihad (holy war) and plan attacks. They first formed a Telegram group named Baab-al-Nur (Gateway to Divine Light) with 25 members.
NIA had recovered chats in Baab-Al-Nur group from August 12, 2016, to September 9, 2016, after seizing the mobile phones of the accused. “Chats in the group on August 15 was against democracy and the celebration of the Independence Day. They claimed the Independence Day as a celebration of Kaffirs (infidel),” Arjun submitted before the court.
According to NIA, on August 18, an accused claimed that Jihad with Kaffir will help in re-establishing the Caliphate. Currently, the Islamic countries are allies of Kaffirs and these nations could not even implement proper Sharia laws in their countries.
It was in another chat on August 27 that the group members discussed to attack pro-RSS leaders to showcase their ‘reach’.
Initially, the group decided to target the Maradu riot case accused Suresh. However, they dropped the plan when they came to know that Suresh was serving a jail sentence. The group then targeted Valsan Thillankeri but due to the presence of police security, it was decided not to act on it. Arjun said the group even discussed attacking two well-known High Court Judges and senior police officer P N Unni Rajan.
Scrutiny of the chat found that some members tried to shift the discussion to another group on Telegram. On August 30, a member of the group rejoiced that a meeting of Jamaat-e-Islami was cancelled due to the security threat.
“Gateway, Knowledge, Playgroup, Darul Fikr and Thasveeb were the other active groups on Telegram used by accused. Baab-Al-Nur had the largest number of members. The group members were also very active on Facebook. However, their Facebook accounts were frequently flagged and deleted. As many as 15 accounts of a member were cancelled by Facebook,” an official told Express.
Manseed Muhmood, Swalih Mohammed, Rashid Ali, Ramshad N K, Safvan and Jasim N K are currently facing trial in the case. The NIA team busted the IS module while conducting a clandestine meeting at Kanakamala in Kannur in October 2016.
NIT graduate was head of IS module