GUWAHATI
The Assam Police Special Task Force (STF) arrested eight members of a “global terror group”, the Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT), in simultaneous operations across three States on the intervening night of December 17 and 18. The ABT is an affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Indian subcontinent.
One of the eight, identified as Mohammed Sad Radi alias Md. Shab Sheikh, is a Bangladeshi national arrested from Kerala. The police said he was sent to India in November to spread their “nefarious ideology” and create sleeper cells across the country.
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Two others, Minarul Sheikh and Md Abbas Ali, were arrested from West Bengal and the remaining five — Nur Islam Mandal, Abdul Karim Mandal, Mojibar Rahman, Hamidul Islam, and Enamul Hoque — were caught from Assam.
The crackdown, codenamed ‘Operation Praghat’, was led by Assam STF chief Partha Sarathi Mahanta and carried out with the help of the Kerala and West Bengal Police forces.
The Assam Police said the operation had been based on intelligence inputs on “clandestine anti-national activities” by a group of individuals under the direction of one Md Farhan Israk, a close associate of ABT chief Jasimuddin Rahmani.
The police said Radi started his activities in Assam and West Bengal after entering India to meet the ABT’s sleeper cell activists before moving to Kerala to expand the base.
“The incriminating documents and mobile phones with technical evidence seized from the arrested accused indicate their continuous communication across the border with Bangladesh and Pakistan-based entities over the last couple of months,” a statement issued by the police said.
The module worked to establish sleeper cells in the country, particularly in Assam and West Bengal.
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“These sleeper cells were intended to serve as covert operational units, poised for subversive and violent activities,” the police said, adding the other arrested persons played a pivotal role in helping Radi in his mission to identify, recruit, and indoctrinate individuals who shared or were inclined to similar fundamentalist ideologies.
“By exploiting local vulnerabilities, religious sentiments and fault lines, they aimed to create a network capable of operating under the radar while remaining loyal to the broader objectives of their organisation, to create disruption and chaos in India,” the police said.
