ISIS extending its reach in India in an attempt to apprehend engineers?

NEW DELHI: Is a module of the Islamic State aimed at young, intelligent people in India? The same group of Syria-based recruiters on Telegram who were also in contact with IS-inspired modules that were uncovered in Delhi and Pune are suspected of radicalising Tauseef Ali Farooqui, an IIT Guwahati final-year student detained for swearing allegiance to terrorist organisation IS.

Intelligence services believe that engineering students in Delhi and other areas of the nation were radicalised by a certain group of internet organisations.
Arshad Warsi, an MTech graduate from Jamia Millia Islamia, and Mohammed Shahnawaz, a BTech from

NIT Nagpur who was detained in Delhi last October, are two more students who are said to have been radicalised by these internet groups. A recent arrest also included BTech graduate Harris Farooqui. With origins in Delhi, Aligarh, and Pune, the trio was a member of the same module, and Harris had a leading position in these modules.

Police added that Harris was using covert messaging applications to communicate with a “foreign-based handler” after the arrests. Additionally, he was charged with radicalising young people and enticing them to join IS using social media and in-person recruitment. An officer said, “They shared materials related to jihad along with incriminating videos of acts of pledging allegiance for this purpose.”
Shahnawaz was in contact with Jamal, a Telegram account headquartered in Syria, since 2017. He was apprehended by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police in October. According to a police investigation, Jamal was an Afghan citizen who died in February 2018 during the Taliban-IS conflict. Additionally, according to the reports, “two entities in the name of Huzaifa al Bakistani and Qasim Khurasani, who were also nationals of Afghanistan, contacted them.” The police have emphasised that many companies are in charge of these Telegram and Rocket chat accounts, among other accounts.
Tauseef Farooqui is being held by the police until April 3.

Tauseef Farooqui “disassociated” himself from the “Indian- construct that includes the so-called Indian Constitution, its institutions, and so on” in his LinkedIn post before his detention. The post he made said, “My first action after my contrition is to perform Hijrat, or migration, towards Muslimeen, to the Islamic State-Khorasan province in order to swear allegiance to the Muslim Leadership (Islamic State)…The Muslimeen, or those who have submitted to Allah, are engaged in combat with the Kafireen, or unbelievers.

The electronic equipment belonging to the IIT student is undergoing forensic analysis. Additionally, the Assam Police claimed to have found the IS flag in Tauseef’s chamber. Another Delhi-born student at the school is also being investigated for possible ties to terrorism.