The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has started a probe into an alleged conspiracy to radicalise and recruit the youngsters in the name of al-Qaeda in the Indian sub-continent (AQIS), by establishing a base in West Bengal, and implement ‘Ghazwa-e-Hind’ in India, people familiar with the development said.
There have been recent intelligence reports that JMB and AQIS are trying to revive their activities in West Bengal, Assam and nearby areas. The federal agency has filed a first information report (FIR) in the matter against 19 individuals including two key members of the module – Abdur Rakib Sarkar alias Habibullah and Kazi Ahasan Ullah and their unknown associates, after the ministry of home affairs (MHA) asked it to unearth the larger conspiracy. On Tuesday, the NIA had arrested 13 people from Assam, Keralam and West Bengal and carried out raids at 16 locations into a cross-border terror conspiracy and radicalisation network linked to Imam Mahmuder Kafila (IMK), which investigators have described as an offshoot of the banned Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB). JMB was banned by the Indian government in 2019.
In August this year, the UN Security Council expressed concerns in a report that AQIS was trying to exploit Bangladesh to establish cells there. It seeks to wage Jihad in order to establish an Islamic state. Ghazwa-e-Hind loosely translates as ‘battle for India’ and is used by several terror groups to justify their terror strikes as religious holy war against India. To be sure, there is no link between the latest cases filed by the NIA and the Red Fort attack.
Established in 2014, AQIS is a branch of al-Qaeda that operates in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Myanmar and Bangladesh. The Kashmir unit of AQIS – Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind (AGuH) – led by a group of doctors had carried out a suicide bombing near the Red Fort on November 10 last year. AGuH was formed in July 2017 by Zakir Rashid Bhat alias Zakir Musa, once a close aide of Burhan Wani, after parting ways with Hizbul Mujahideen.
“A case has been filed on information that members of AQIS, which has also been called ‘al Qaida Barr-E-Sagir’, in West Bengal was propagating terrorism by radicalizing like-minded youths and carrying out regular recruitment with a view to overthrow the democratically elected government to establish ‘Shariah rule’ in India as well as Bangladesh, and implement Ghazwa-e-Hind,” said an officer, who asked not to be named.
