Movement for war of Islam: NIA says ISIS module inspired by Masood Azhar’s message

New Delhi, June 22: Investigations conducted by the National Investigation Agency have established that several persons had entered into a criminal conspiracy to wage violent jihad against India and also establish the caliphate of the Islamic State.

The module was being guided by three ISIS handlers based abroad. The module made extensive use of encrypted social media applications/chat platforms. These have been recovered from their mobile phones, the NIA said in its chargesheet.

NIA had registered the case on December 20.2018 against Mufti Suhail and others on the allegation that Mufti Suhail has formed an ISIS module with others to commit terror activities and the module is amassing weapons and explosives.

They had named this module as 'Harkat-ul-Harb-E-Islam' (Movement for War of Islam).

This group owed its allegiance to ISIS and wanted to establish an ISIS Caliphate in India by resorting to large scale terrorist attacks in and around National Capital Region. The group carried out reconnaissance of some such locations in and around NCR.

Forensic reports in respect of the seized chemicals and IED making material has affirmed that these were sufficient to manufacture sophisticated IEDs. The group wanted to manufacture IED, to be detonated by remote controlled devices, of more than 100 meters range.

A large quantity of e-books, messages in encrypted chats and detailed manuals issued by ISIS and affiliated terror entities for training in bomb making, IED making and methods to inflict mass casualties have been recovered from the seized mobile phones.

Mufti Suhail was also giving radicalisation sermons to the other members of the module wherein he exhorted them to offer themselves for the violent Jihad against infidels in India. Two of the accused persons also recorded rehearsal video of their resolve to fight violent Jihad that was to be published after their suicide attacks.

The mobile phones of accused persons contain high amount of ISIS propaganda material.

These include execution videos, violent Jihadi anthems, videos/audio proclaiming solidarity with Kashmiri terrorists, audio messages by an ISIS handler, and radicalisation sermons of Maulana Masood Azhar (Chief of Jaish-E-Muhammad), Abdus Sami Qasmi (another accused in an NIA ISIS related case), and Asim Umar ( alleged Chief of Al-Qaida in Indian Subcontinent).