Shahadat-e-al-Hikma: Is this a new terror outfit in West Bengal

'Shahadat-e-al-Hikma'-the name may not ring a bell but this is an organisation that was born in Bangladesh in 2003 and it was suspected that it got all its funding from Dawood Ibrahim. The Bangladesh government banned the organisation, a few months after it was born.

Considered to be defunct, the name of this outfit cropped up during an investigation being conducted in a terror case in West Bengal.

When the National Investigation Agency (NIA) questioned an operative by the name Anwar Hussain in connection with the Khagragarh blasts case, he revealed that the outfit running this operation was Shahadat-e-al-Hikma.

Intelligence Bureau officials say that the outfit had gone defunct back in 2003 itself. It never really took off as it was banned immediately.

There are some members of this outfit who still exist in Bangladesh and they could be running it. Officials also say that there are many such splinter outfits who work behind the scenes for the major groups.

After the Burdwan blasts, there was a lot of heat on Jamaat-ul Mujahideen, Bangladesh.

Both India and Bangladesh had cracked down on this outfit. The JMB even went on to form an alliance with the ISIS in a bid to establish the Bengal caliphate. The resurfacing of the Shahadat-e-al-Hikma could well be a ploy on part of the JMB to take the heat off it, the officer also adds.

In 2014, Bangladesh agencies had reported that there was an attempt to reactivate this outfit.

The members may have entered into an alliance with the JMB, officials also add. As per investigations, the role of this outfit is to carry out the first stage of training for the new recruits.

It was revealed that this group undertakes training at a camp in Chittagong. IB officials say that it is quite clear that the name of this group has come up only to give the JMB a deniability factor.

OneIndia News