Guwahati: In an intelligence-based nationwide crackdown on a global terrorist organisation, the Assam Police’s Special Task Force (STF), in close coordination with the Kerala and West Bengal Police, busted a terror module that was planning to strike.
The STF arrested eight operatives of the terrorist group Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT) – an affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) – during simultaneous operations carried out in Kerala, West Bengal and Assam on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday, Assam Police CPRO, Pranabjyoti Goswami, said in a press statement on Thursday.
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The terror module was working to establish sleeper cells across India, specifically in Assam and West Bengal. One of the operatives, Md Sad Radi aka Md Shab Sheikh – a Bangladeshi national – was apprehended in Kerala, the statement added.
While two other operatives are from West Bengal, the remaining five are from Assam. Codenamed ‘Operation Praghat,’ the operation was led by STF chief Partha Sarathi Mahanta, it said.
The operation was launched based on intelligence inputs regarding clandestine anti-national activities being carried out by a group of individuals under the direction of one Md Farhan Israk – a close associate of ABT chief Jasimuddin Rahmani, it added.
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The Bangladeshi national, Md Sad Radi, was sent to India in November this year to spread their nefarious ideology and create sleeper cells across the country, it said.
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He visited Assam and West Bengal to meet sleeper-cell activists of ABT before moving to Kerala for the same purpose, it added.
The other arrested operatives are Minarul Sheikh aged 40, Md Abbas Ali aged 33 (both residents of West Bengal), Nur Islam Mandal (40), Abdul Karim Mandal (30), Mojibar Rahman (46), Hamidul Islam (34) and Enamul Hoque (29) – all from Assam’s Kokrajhar and Dhubri districts, it said.
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, it added.
These sleeper cells were intended to serve as covert operational units, poised for subversive and violent activities that would be initiated to disrupt peace and tranquillity as well as cause destruction of life and property, it said.
The arrested persons played a pivotal role in aiding Md Sad Radi in his mission to identify, recruit and indoctrinate individuals who share or were inclined to similar fundamentalist ideologies, it added.
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 statement further said.