Two arrested by NIA from Kanpur

LUCKNOW: National Investigation Agency on Tuesday arrested two youths from Kanpur district for planning terrorist acts. Believed to be members of ISIS related module which is active in Kanpur, the 26-year-old youth

Asif Iqbal

is cousin brother of Saifiullah, the alleged ISIS inspired terror operative who was gunned down on March 7 at Kakori area in Lucknow. The second youth aged 27 was identified as

Mohammad Atif

. Both of them stayed at Jajmau locality under the jurisdiction of Chakeri police station in Kanpur and were known to each other.

The family says the two have been framed as they were not willing to turn as approver before court on NIA’s insistence. Atif’s older brother Aquib said, “On May 3 we had called advocate Mohammad Shoaib from Rihai Manch to help us. We had called media and told them that my brother Atif was being pressurized.”

The two youths came under the lens of intelligence agencies soon after Saifiullah was killed in an encounter which lasted for more than 24 hours. Saifiullah was part of 9-membered ‘Khorasan module’ which had its roots in Kanpur. The same module was held accused of orchestrating blast in

Bhopal

– Ujjain passenger train on March 7.
Later on

Madhya Pradesh

police, anti-terrorist squad of UP police and NIA arrested eight others including former air force employee Ghaus Mohammad, Mohammad Faizal and Mohammad Azhar. The trio and Saifiullah stayed in Jajmau locality and came in contact while visiting mosques.

Advocate Mohammad Shoaib from Rihai Manch said that he had forwarded representation to various government authorities about the threat looming over Asif and Atif. “Being Saifiullah’s cousin and a young men, Asif was picked up a lot of times by intelligence agencies. The policemen tried to convince Asif to testify against Ghaus, Faizal and Azhar before court and dub them members of Khorasan module. He refused to give in,” said Shoaib, who was camping in Kanpur.

Meanwhile, a team led by SP NIA Deepak Kumar, arrested the duo on charges of waging war against the country from Chakeri area on 4.15pm on Tuesday. The duo was booked under IPC sections 121, 121A, 123, 124A and sections 16, 18, 23 and 38 under Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and would be produced at the designated court in Lucknow on Wednesday.