Arrested recruit Subahani got in touch with IS through social media

Later, when he was released by the IS and returned home to live with his wife and children, he got in touch with the terror outfit  again through social media and became one of their local contact in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, exposing gaping holes in screening of social media networks by intelligence agencies. 

Cyber security experts claim that with the mushrooming number of social media platforms, it is easy for things to slip through. Especially for those IS sympathisers who are already in touch with their handlers as they soon move on the dark web where the identities are much harder to crack. “We do have managed to achieve some success in penetrating the radical groups in the dark web but it’s much more difficult,” said a Bengaluru-based cyber security expert. 

Meanwhile, NIA investigations have revealed more startling details regarding a large IS module that have made huge inroads in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Though NIA had picked up many youth for questioning after they cracked the module and arrested six persons in Kannur and Kozhikode in Kerala, this is the first arrest recorded in Tamil Nadu in connection with this case. Subahani Haja Moidheen originally hails from Maliyekal House, Market Road, Thodupuzha in Kerala.

NIA had raided Subahani’s house, Taiyaba Manzil, at Kader Moideen Pallivasal Street, Kadayanallur on October 3 and he was later summoned to the NIA office, Kochi. When the NIA officials, who had intelligence regarding his association with the terrorist organisation, grilled him he had told the investigators that he had left for Iraq on April 8 last year to join IS and fight for the organisation. He lied to his family that he was going to attend Umrah. 

NIA sources said Subahani was radicalised and recruited by IS which propagate their ideology through social media platforms. He left for Istanbul in Turkey from Chennai on a visit visa first and then crossed the border along with similar minded people from Pakistan and Afganistan to the IS territory in Iraq. 

He then reached Mosul and where he was given intense religious training in Islamic Sharia. NIA sources said Subahani was carrying out the IS security duties at Mosul for over two weeks. He was also paid a monthly allowance of $100 by ISIS for carrying out his duty. However, he decided to return after he could not withstand the war misery in Mosul and even had seen two of his fellow fighters charred to death in a shell attack. 

However, when he expressed his wish to leave Mosul, he was imprisoned and tortured and was incarcerated at Raqqa in Syria. However, for reasons not known, he was allowed to leave by the IS leadership along with five other foreign nationals, he revealed to the investigators. He then stayed at Istanbul illegally for two weeks and with the help of the Indian Embassy there got back to India on September 22, 2015. Since then he had been staying at his ancestral house in Kadayanallur with his wife and was working as salesman at a gold jewellery retailer.

NIA said after getting in touch with his handlers again, Subahani had travelled to Chennai, Coimbatore and to various other places to meet other local contacts in the conspiracy, to collect money and to procure explosives for conducting terror attacks in South India. 

He was produced before the Ernakulam special magistrate and was remanded to judicial custody. NIA will be moving a petition seeking his police custody for further interrogation on Friday.