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T’gana: NIA files charge sheet against 11 in PFI case
The NIA said investigations have revealed that the accused “were radicalising gullible Muslim youth and recruiting them into the PFI through speeches filled with hatred and venom against the government of India” as well as other organisations and individuals.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Friday filed the charge sheet against 11 people, allegedly arrested for organising terrorist training camps and recruiting members for the banned outfit Popular Front of India (PFI) in Telangana, people in know of the developments said.
The NIA in a statement stated that a charge sheet has been filed before the NIA special court in Hyderabad on Thursday. The case, which was initially registered by the Nizamabad police on July 4, 2022, was handed over to the NIA, which re-registered the case on August 26.
The NIA said investigations have revealed that the accused “were radicalising gullible Muslim youth and recruiting them into the PFI through speeches filled with hatred and venom against the government of India” as well as other organisations and individuals.
“Once recruited into the PFI, the Muslim youth were sent to the training camps organised by the PFI under the cover and guise of yoga classes and physical education (PE) beginners course (BC), where they were trained in the use of everyday articles (knife, sickle and iron rods) to kill a person and for commission of terror acts,” the central agency said.
The accused were booked under Sections 120-A (criminal conspiracy by two or more persons), 120-B (criminal conspiracy for serious offence), 153-A (promoting enmity between two different groups) and 141 (unlawful assembly) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), besides Section 17, 18, 18A and 18B of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.
The accused were identified as: Abdul Khader, Abdul Ahad, Shaik Shadullah, Shaik Imran, Syed Yahiya Sameer and Mohd Abdul Mubeen (all from Nizamabad); Abdul Saleem and Mohd Osman from Jagtial; Feroz Khan from Adilabad; Mohammad Irfan from Karimnagar and Shaik Iliyas Ahmed from Nellore, Andhra Pradesh.
“Further investigations in the matter are ongoing,” the NIA statement said.
During the crackdown on the PFI activists in September, the NIA teams had raided the premises of the PFI state headquarters in Telangana’s Chandrayangutta and seized some electronic gadgets and flags from the office and later sealed the office building,
The NIA teams also raided eight other places in Telangana’s Karimnagar, Adilabad and Nizamabad districts. Similar raids were conducted in the Autonagar area of Andhra Pradesh’s Guntur district and also in Kurnool.
During the searches, the NIA sleuths seized incriminating materials, including digital devices, documents, two daggers and cash worth ₹8.31 lakh.
