Former Karnataka Congress MLA's grandson arrested over suspected links with Kerala module of Islamic State

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NEW DELHI: The National Investigating Agency (NIA), in a joint operation with Karnataka Police, has arrested the grandson of late former Congress MLA B M Idinabba over suspected links with the Kerala module of the Islamic State.

According to reports, 35-year-old Ammar Abdul Rahman was arrested from Ullal in Mangaluru following raids by the NIA.

Rahman was held in connection with the Kerala module of the Islamic State which is being investigated by the federal agency since March this year. According to the NIA, Rahman’s niece is believed to be among the 13 residents of Kerala’s Kasaragod, who left India to fight for the IS in 2016. 

The security agencies believe that a total of 21 people left Kerala during that time to join the IS. Importantly, the NIA along with J&K Police has arrested five members of the ISIS module arrested from Karnataka and Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.

All these five people were arrested for their alleged role in propagating the ISIS propaganda on social media and luring the youth for ‘Jihad’.

Based on the inputs gathered by the intelligence sources, the arrested members of the module were involved in radicalising the youths, planning targeted assassination of select right-wing leaders, media personalities and mobilising funds for ISIS.

Kerala IS module headed by one - Mohammed Ameen - was first busted by the NIA in March 2021. The central agency also later arrested three people on March 14-15.

Based on the info provided by them during the interrogation, the agency carefully examined the data obtained from the seized digital media for the identification of other members of the module.

The agencies began to track the activities of the module when it came to their notice that it was operating an Instagram Channel, ‘Chronicle Foundation’ with more than 5,000 members nearly a year ago.