IS men in TN planned forest base in K’taka for jihad in India: NIA

They had been communicating with foreign handlers through the dark web, NIA further said. All the accused were arrested by the Q branch this January and the case was later taken over by NIA. The fraudulently activated mobile SIMs were purchased by one Liyakat Ali, an accused from Chennai and Salem and provided to Moideen, pursuant to the conspiracy hatched in Tamil Nadu and Bengaluru with members of the IS cell in Karnataka.

NIA noted that Bengaluru IS module members Mohammed Haneef Khan and Imran Khan had taken Moideen, along with his associates Abdul Samad, and Syed Ali Navas, on Hijrah (migration) outside India, from Bangalore on December 12, 2019, before Moideen and his associates returned to India with the intention of waging jihad and were arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police on January 8.

Mohammad Zaid, arrested from Bengaluru, assisted Moideen to communicate with his online handler, over encrypted email and messenger platforms in the dark web, to hatch the conspiracy to carry out terrorist attacks in India by recruiting more members into the terrorist gang and imparting arms training outside India. Ejaz Pasha, a suspect arrested in the case, had helped Moideen and co-conspirator Mehboob Pasha of Bangalore to procure pistols and ammunition, illegally and that too has been recovered, noted the NIA release. Hussain Shariff, another accused arrested had stored the weapons in his house at Bangalore along with some of the material procured by Moideen and associates for living in forests.