The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Thursday arrested an ISIS terror conspirator after he landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi from Kenya’s Nairobi.
The accused has been identified as Arafath Ali who hails from Shivamogga district of Karnataka. He has been absconding since 2020, when he was accused of indulging in ISIS propaganda activities and planning terrorist acts.
An NIA spokesperson said told The Indian Express that Ali has been taken into custody after he landed.
“It marks a major breakthrough for the NIA in its efforts to uncover and foil the conspiracy of foreign-based Islamic State modules to carry out terrorist acts in India,” the spokesperson said.
“He had since been operating from abroad to promote the anti-India terror agenda of ISIS. Investigations have revealed that Ali was actively involved in the identification, radicalisation and recruitment of gullible Muslim youths into the proscribed global terror group while working from abroad,” the spokesperson said.
The NIA official added that as part of the Shivamogga terror conspiracy case, Mohammed Shariq, had been on his way to plant a pressure cooker IED at Kadri Manjunatha Temple, Mangaluru, when the IED exploded accidentally in an auto-rickshaw.
Ali had been in touch with the other accused persons in the case, the spokesperson added.