Karnataka tops list of ISIS recruits

Bengaluru, Nov 24: There had been a great deal of confusion over the status of Sultan Armar, the head and founder of the Ansar-ul-Tawhid which is the recruiting agency for the ISIS in India.

Armar a resident of Bhatkal was a major operative and had even been declared the emir of the Ansar in a video message by none other than Abu Bakr al-Bhagdadi.

A few months back it was reported by social media sites sympathetic to the ISIS that Armar had died while fighting. While the Indian agencies did not immediately confirm this development, today there is confirmation about his death.

The Indian agencies have listed six Indians who have died fighting alognside the ISIS in either Iraq or Syria.

Six Indian ISIS recruits have died:

The Indian agencies say that there is confirmation today that four Indian recruits with the ISIS have died while fighting either in Iraq or Syria.

They are Athif Vaseem Mohammed from Adilabad, Telangana; Mohammed Umar Subhan from Shivaji Nagar, Bengaluru; Maulana Abdul Kabir Sultan Armar from Bhatkal, Karnataka; Saheem Farooque Tanki from Thane, Maharashtra; Faiz Masood from Bengaluru and Mohammed Sajid alias Bada Sajid from Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh.

The case relating to Bada Sajid is a bit different. As per the initial reports, this Indian Mujahideen operative had joined the al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and had died in battle over there, Intelligence Bureau reports had suggested.

The list that the Ministry for Home Affairs has prepared also states that there are 23 Indians currently who are with the ISIS.

Five are from Karnataka, three from Tamil Nadu and four each from Kerala, Telangana and Maharashtra.

With the confirmation of the news that Sultan Armar is dead, the IB is now closely tracking the movements of his brother Shafi Armar.

It is said that Shafi had been in charge of the Ansar since the death of his brother. Shafi is beleived to be operating out of the UAE.

However, while being tracked, it has been found that he was making an attempt to move into Syria.

OneIndia News