TIRUPUR / RAMANATHAPURAM: A garment printing unit owner in Tirupur, Faizur Rahman, was on Wednesday arrested by the
Ramanathapuram district police for allegedly printing slogans hailing the militant outfit Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) on T-shirts. With this the number of persons arrested in connection with the unusual case - since ISIS is not an outlawed organisation in India - has gone up to three.
A group of 24 Muslim youth had worn the T-shirts on Ramzan eve and posed for a group photograph outside a mosque in Thondi in Ramanathapuram district. The photograph has since gone viral online.
Recently, police had arrested two persons Abdul Rahman and Rilwan, for sourcing the T-shirts containing the slogan “We are all for ISIS”, and organising them to pose for a photo.
Sources said the two had approached Faizur who has a garment printing unit at Kanakkampalayam about 10 km from Tirupur and got the slogan printed on the black T-shirts. Faizur is also an Imam at a local mosque in Perumanallur.
Meanwhile, Abdul Rahman told Express on Wednesday that he had never imagined that the group photo could land him in such controversy. “I had sold the T-shirts for `250 each to my friends but I was not even aware if the ISIS was an outlawed organisation in our country. I merely wanted to show my gratitude to the ISIS because its members had helped stranded Indian nurses to return from Iraq,” he claimed.
According to him, soon after he posted the controversial photograph on a social media network, he had deleted it on the advice of family members. “I deleted the picture within an hour of posting as elders in the family and my friends though it could land me in trouble. But someone else had downloaded the photo and it went viral,” he said while being taken to a court.
His uncle Khader Mohideen, said Abdul’s mother Soukhath Nikkah had fallen sick following his arrest.