KOLKATA, Dec 22: A suspected member of a militant outfit in Kashmir Valley was arrested in West Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district on Sunday, a senior police officer said.
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Javed Munshi, suspected to be a member of the outlawed ‘Tehreek e Mujahideen’ outfit in Kashmir Valley, was picked up from near Canning Hospital by a joint team of Jammu and Kashmir Police and West Bengal Police’s Special Task Force, the officer said.
Javed, who claimed he was visiting the residence of a relative in Canning town for personal reasons, had been allegedly involved in subversive activities in the valley and was wanted by the Jammu and Kashmir Police for a long time, he said.
The ‘Tehreek e Mujahideen’ is controlled from Pakistan and has contacts with other militant outfits in the valley, Pakistan and Bangladesh, the officer said.
He said ‘Jihadi literature’ was found in the possession of Javed who had been tasked with indoctrinating locals into the ideology of outfits such as ‘Tehreek e Mujahideen’ and recruiting Muslim youths into the outfit.
“We are investigating with J-K Police whether he was building a sleeper cell network in South 24 Parganas district. We are also verifying if he is an IED expert and who his local contacts were,” he said.
Javed had recently travelled to Nepal and was planning to cross over to Bangladesh en route to Pakistan, the officer said.
The owners of the Gulshan House building, where Javed was staying, claimed they knew the arrested person was involved in the sale of shawls and was a resident of Srinagar but were not aware of his links with any terror outfit or other activities.
The arrested man was remanded on transit till December 31 after being produced at Alipore court.
The arrest followed the recent clampdown on eight suspected members of a terrorist outfit Ansar-al-Islam Bangladesh, who were planning to target the ‘chicken’s neck corridor’ connecting West Bengal’s Siliguri with the northeastern states.
Two of the eight arrested were from Murshidabad district and part of a group of eight people apprehended by West Bengal, Kerala and Assam Police. (Agencies)
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