Bengaluru woman arrested as part of Gujarat social media radicalisation probe

On July 22, Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad arrested four people from Ahmedabad, Modasa (Gujarat), Delhi, and Noida for allegedly promoting AQIS videos

Published on: Jul 30, 2025, 15:27:06 IST

By Maulik Pathak

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The Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) has arrested a 30-year-old Bengaluru woman for allegedly operating social media accounts promoting content from the banned terrorist group Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS). This was the fifth arrest as part of ATS’s probe into social media radicalisation.

Five people have been arrested in the case. (X)

An ATS officer said that Shama Parveen, the accused, was brought to Gujarat from Bengaluru on transit remand after her arrest on Tuesday with the help of central agencies and Karnataka Police.

Gujarat home minister Harsh Sanghavi called Parveen “highly radicalised” and said she ran an online terror module. “We have recovered Pakistani contacts from her electronic devices. Gujarat ATS has so far arrested five AQIS terrorists running this online terror module.”

On July 22, ATS arrested four people from Ahmedabad, Modasa (Gujarat), Delhi, and Noida (Uttar Pradesh) for allegedly promoting AQIS videos on social media. One of the accused, Mohammad Faiq, allegedly downloaded content from some accounts, edited it, and reposted it, allegedly calling for terror activities.

The ATS found Parveen allegedly operated these source accounts. It examined her mobile phone and found she was allegedly disseminating terrorist content on Instagram and Facebook, including AQIS leader Maulana Assim Umar’s speeches. The content allegedly called for armed revolution, spread religious hatred, etc.

Parveen also allegedly posted content featuring AQIS’s Anwar al Awlaki. One of the posts allegedly asked Indian Muslim youth to carry out violence against non-believers.

A second ATS officer said Parveen allegedly posted a video of Maulana Abdul Aziz from Pakistan’s Lal Masjid. “The video was to encourage Muslims to wage armed struggle to overthrow the Indian government forcefully and to spread discord in the country based on religious and caste divisions.” Officials said they found social media and email accounts on her phone and contacts with foreign and Pakistani entities.

The arrested accused have been booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, and Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita’s sections 113 (promoting enmity), 152 (public mischief), 196 (conspiracy to commit offences against the state), and 61 (criminal conspiracy).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Maulik Pathak
He is an Ahmedabad-based journalist with more than two decades of experience. His career spans business journalism and general news, with reporting across politics, crime, governance, public policy, business, industry, infrastructure, energy, ports, aviation, the environment, wildlife and social issues. He began his career in feature writing before moving into business journalism, reporting on companies and sectors including energy, infrastructure, pharmaceuticals, automobiles and real estate. Over the years, his work expanded to politics, courts, crime, public policy, civic affairs, the environment and wildlife. His reporting has taken him from government offices and courtrooms to factory floors, ports, forests and remote villages, covering stories that range from industrial investments and financial markets to elections, conservation and issues affecting everyday life. While many assignments demand the pace of the daily news cycle, others require sustained reporting over months and years to follow developments beyond the headlines. He started his journalism career with the Asian Age in Ahmedabad in 2002 as a feature writer and sub-editor. Since 2022, he has been working with Hindustan Times. Earlier, he worked with Business Standard, DNA, The Economic Times, Mint and The Times of India. His longest stint was with Mint, where he spent more than eight years reporting across multiple beats. During his career, he has worked in both reporting and editing roles, contributing to page planning, local editions and special editorial projects as newsrooms evolved from print-first operations to digital publishing. Early in his career, he also worked on media and documentary projects with an NGO and as a copywriter at a communications agency before returning to journalism. Away from work, he sometimes makes time for a pair of binoculars, table tennis, cinema and the occasional poem.Read More

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