Five 'IS terrorists' arrested by NIA sent to judicial custody

A local court on Thursday remanded five persons, arrested by the National Investigation Agency in Hyderabad on Wednesday on charges of their involvement in a terror module suspected to be linked to the Islamic State and conspiring to carry out bomb attacks, in judicial custody for 14 days.

The accused were produced in the chamber of the metropolitan sessions judge by NIA amidst heavy security.

The judge remanded them in judicial custody though the investigating agency has filed an application seeking their police custody for further examination.

NIA’s application for police custody is likely to come up for hearing on Friday.

The accused were later shifted to Cherlapally Central Prison.

Mohammed Ibrahim Yazdani alias Ibbu, Habeeb Mohammed alias Sir, Mohammed Ilyas Yazdani, Abdullah Bin Ahmed Al Amoodi and Muzaffar Hussain Rizwan were arrested by the NIA after a series of searches were conducted at 10 locations in Old City area, with the assistance from Hyderabad Police. The agency had detained six others, including a techie, during the operation.

According to NIA, the preliminary examination has revealed that the gang was preparing improvised explosive devices for commission of terror acts and was being guided by an online handler suspected to be based in Iraq/Syria.

The NIA had earlier registered a case based on credible information that some youths hailing from Hyderabad and their accomplices have entered into a criminal conspiracy to wage war against the Government of India by collecting weapons and explosive materials by targeting public places, including religious sites and sensitive government buildings and others in various parts of the country.

The agency recovered firearms, ammunition, precursor chemicals for making explosives, digital exhibits and Rs 15 lakh cash from the searched locations.

The NIA also seized two semi-automatic pistols with ammunition, an air gun with telescopic sight and shooting practice target boards, a large number of digital items including six laptops, about 40 mobile phones, 32 SIM cards, and a large number of hard disks, memory cards, pen drives, and digital tabs.

Meanwhile, local police today dismissed as ‘rumours’ and ‘false’ certain messages that are being circulated in social media about the threat to public safety and security in the wake of the arrests made by the NIA.