Convicted twice for terror, Saquib Nachan among 15 arrested by NIA

“The investigations have revealed that the accused, all members of ISIS Maharashtra module, were operating from Padgha-Borivali, where they had hatched the conspiracy to spread terror and carry out acts of violence across India. Pursuing the path of violent jihad, Khilafat, ISIS etc, the accused had aimed to disturb the peace and communal harmony of the country and wage a war against the Government of India,” NIA said in a statement on Saturday.

The arrested accused, NIA claimed, had self-declared Padgha village in rural Thane as a ‘liberated zone’ and as ‘Al Sham’. They were motivating impressionable Muslim youth to relocate here from their place of residence to strengthen the Padgha base.

The current case was initially probed by the Special Cell of Delhi Police, after the arrest of three alleged ISIS terrorists, Shahnawaz Alam, Mohammad Rizwan Ashraf and Mohammad Arshad Warsi. Upon the directions of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, the NIA took over the case in November 2023 under various sections of the IPC, Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and Explosive Substances Act.

The others arrested are identified as Hasib Zuber Mulla, Kashif Abdul Sattar Balere, Saif Ateeque Nachan, Rehan Ashfaque Suse, Shagaf Safiq Divkar, Firoz Dastagir Kuwari, Adil Iliyas Khot, Musab Haseeb Mulla, Rafil Abdul Latif Nachan, Yahya Ravish Khot, Razil Abdul Latif Nachan, Farhan Ansar Suse, Mukhlis Maqbool Nachan and Munzir Abubakar Kunnathpeedikal.

Key accused Nachan, who the NIA said was the head of the ISIS module, has been under the radar of the security agencies since the 1990s. He was booked in over a dozen terror cases and convicted twice. In 1997, he was convicted by the Supreme Court for planning terror attacks in India in the early 1990s along with Khalistani terrorists. After being booked in the 2002-03 terror blasts in Mumbai, he was convicted in 2016 again for 10 years by a court in Mumbai under the Arms Act. He served both the sentences and was released in 2017. Earlier, his son Shamil Nachan was arrested by the NIA in the Maharashtra ISIS module related terror case.

Multiple teams of NIA Delhi, Maharashtra and Karnataka comprising dozens of officials simultaneously raided 44 locations in Padgha-Borivali, Kalyan, Bhiwandi, Thane city, Mira Road and Pune in Maharashtra, and Bengaluru in Karnataka. The agency seized one pistol, two air guns, eight swords/ knives, two laptops, six hard disks, three CDs, 38 mobile phones, 10 magazine books, Rs 68,03,800 in cash and 51 Hamas flags.

Investigations have revealed that the arrested accused were operating on the directions of their foreign handlers. They had been actively involved in various terrorist activities, including fabrication of Improvised Explosive Device (IEDs), for furthering the violent and destructive agenda of ISIS.

ISIS, a global terror organisation, has been spreading its terror network in India by putting in place localised ISIS modules and cells in various states. NIA had registered a case against the ISIS Maharashtra module earlier this year.