NIA gets 7-day custody of accused extradited from Rwanda in Bengaluru prison radicalisation case

Salman Khan was extradited from Rwanda on November 28 through the efforts of the NIA, the CBI’s Global Operations Centre, and Interpol’s National Central Bureau.

Salman Khan is accused number eight in a prison radicalisation case from July 2023, originally registered by the Bengaluru Central Crime Branch before it was taken over by the NIA in October 2023.

The NIA filed a chargesheet in February, naming eight persons as accused, including Salman Khan and a key figure in the 2008 serial blasts case in Bengaluru, the LeT-linked Tadiyandavede Nasir.

The LeT man, incarcerated since 2009 in the serial blasts case, is alleged to have radicalised several Muslim youths in the Bengaluru central prison to take up terrorism. Salman Khan was housed there from 2018 to 2022 in a Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act case.

Salman Khan was arrested in 2018 as a 23-year-old by the Bengaluru police in connection with a case under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, following a complaint by the father of a 16-year-old girl from his neighbourhood. He was acquitted on August 11, 2022, after the victim reportedly turned hostile. Salman Khan later moved to Rwanda but was allegedly in contact with other indoctrinated youths, including several arrested in 2017 for the murder of a businessman.

“Part of a terror radicalisation and recruitment case of Bengaluru Central Prison, Salman was taken into custody by the NIA, with the assistance of the Rwanda Investigation Bureau (RIB), Interpol, and NCBs, on November 27, 2024, and brought to India this morning,” the NIA said in an official statement on November 28 following the extradition.

Salman Khan allegedly facilitated the collection of explosives for other terror accused after being radicalised and recruited during his incarceration by Nasir, a life convict, the NIA said.

“Nasir had orchestrated the radicalisation and subsequent criminal activities, including plans to facilitate his own escape en route to the court from the prison and a conspiracy to further the operations of the proscribed terrorist organisation LeT,” the NIA stated.

Salman Khan told the special court on November 28 that he was taken into custody by the NIA in Rwanda between 7 am and 8 am on November 27 and brought to Mumbai around 4 am on November 28. He was initially remanded to 14 days’ judicial custody and his passport impounded.

2017 murder of Bengaluru businessman

Salman Khan is the second of three missing former undertrial prisoners to be arrested in recent months in India in connection with the prison radicalisation plot allegedly involving the LeT and ISI-linked prisoners at the Bengaluru central jail.

The Special Cell of Delhi Police arrested a missing suspect, Vikram Kumar alias Mohammed Usman, 24, a resident of Bengaluru, on March 18 over an alleged ISI-inspired plot to carry out attacks during the Lok Sabha polls in April-May 2024. Usman has now been identified as an accused in the 2017 murder of a businessman in Bengaluru. He was also allegedly influenced by T Nasir during the 2018-19 period following his incarceration for the murder in R T Nagar in 2017.

The person named by the Special Cell as the alleged handler of Usman is Junaid Ahmed, 29, a still missing suspect in the prison radicalisation case, who also came under the influence of Nasir while in the prison in the 2017 murder case along with Usman and others.

Usman came in touch with several people jailed in terrorism cases, including Nasir, Munaf, Aasif Bhai and others, “who inspired him to join them and they all motivated him to convert his religion and he finally converted to the Muslim religion and he changed his name to Mohd Usman,” according to court documents from Delhi.

The investigation in Delhi has revealed that Junaid Ahmed, the missing link in the NIA’s prison radicalisation case in Bengaluru and the second key accused in the case, after Nasir, sent Usman
Rs 80,000 through contacts in Begu Sarai, Bihar, which Usman allegedly used on the directions of Ahmed to procure arms and ammunition from Munger in the eastern state.

According to the NIA’s investigations in Bengaluru, Salman Khan and Usman “arranged arms, ammunition, hand grenades, and walkie-talkies” at the behest of Nasir and the missing Junaid Ahmed, which were subsequently hidden away.

Vagamon terror camp case

T Nasir, the alleged LeT man, has been incarcerated since 2009 in the Bengaluru central prison in connection with the 2008 Bengaluru serial blasts. He is also among 18 members of the banned Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) convicted for seven years in 2018 by an NIA court in Kerala for being part of a terror training camp at Vagamon in 2007.

On July 18, 2023, shortly after receiving information from a central agency, the Bengaluru Central Crime Branch police arrested five people with a history of crime for the alleged possession of seven country-made pistols, 45 live bullets, and for allegedly planning some form of terror attack in the future after being influenced by Nasir.

Investigations of the communication and electronic devices seized from the accused revealed the transfer of funds from abroad to members of the arrested group in Bengaluru.

The initial Bengaluru investigation indicated that Nasir, who had been in prison for over 13 years, radicalised a few members of a group of 20 men who were lodged in the Bengaluru central prison between 2018 and 2019 over the murder of a businessman in October 2017.

The police alleged that Nasir inspired Junaid Ahmed, 29, to take up the cause of his religion and facilitated the creation of a module. Ahmed left the country for Dubai around 2021 and is reported as being absconding by investigating agencies.