Charges framed against 7 ISIS accused

A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court here on Tuesday framed charges against seven out of eight accused in ISIS Omar Al-Hindi module case. The NIA had registered the case suo motu on October 1, 2016.

The case is based on information about a group of youth involved in allegedly spreading objectives of the proscribed organisation ISIS in southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. They formed an ISIS module, Ansarul Khilafa-KL, over social media platforms and had allegedly made preparations to carry out attacks on important people including judges, police officers, politicians, foreign nationals and rationalists residing in India.

The NIA had arrested six members of the terror module on October 2, 2016. The members had allegedly organised a conspiracy meeting at Kanakamala in Kannur district of Kerala. Subsequently, another member of the module was arrested following deportation from the United Arab Emirates.

In the same case, on October 5, 2016, NIA arrested an ISIS operative Subahani Haja Moideen alias Abu Jasmine, who had allegedly traveled to Iraq/ Syria in April 2015 and is believed to have fought for the terrorist organisation in the name of Islamic Caliphate. He returned to India in September 2015, and allegedly continued his activities in support of the ISIS in India.

NIA has filed charge sheet against all the accused in the case under different sections of Indian Penal Code. The case has been posted to September 6, 2018, for framing of charges against Subahani Haja Moideen and for finalising the trial schedule.