ALARMING: Islamic State secretly running 'terror classes’ in Kerala, 40 people indoctrinated, claims woman recruit

Kochi: A woman recruiter for Islamic State has made sensational revelations before the Special Investigation Team of Kerala Police that the Iraq and Syria based global terror outfit is secretly running terror classes in Kerala where so far 40 people have been indoctrinated in its ideology of jihad.

Yasmin Ahmad, a 28-year-old school teacher in Kerala who was recently arrested on the grounds of being a suspected ISIS recruit, told the investigators that a person called Abdul Rashid, a fugitive ISIS recruiter held these classes, and is now operating out of Afghanistan.

We have identified some of those who attended radicalisation sessions conducted by Rashid in Thrikkaripur in north Kerala’s Kasargode. We are closely watching movements of some of them, said a senior officer of the Kerala Police SIT.

Ahmad was arrested at the Delhi airport last week, when she was about to board a flight to Kabul.

She was reportedly going to join Rashid there.

Rashid is believed to have orchestrated the disappearance of 21 youth from Kerala in the months of May and June.

Ahmad couldn’t go along with the group of 21 due to some problem with her 4-year-old child’s travel documents. She belongs to Saudi Arabia and came to Kerala three years ago after she found a job in Peace International School in Malappuram, where she met Rashid.

Rashid used to conduct the sessions in the guise of Quran classes, where he briefed the recruits about the ISIS. He regularly read the ISIS magazine, Dabiq, and used material from online propaganda to radicalise youth.