Qaeda eyes Hyderabad as base, terrorist outfit plans a huge push to create an Islamist state in India

Hyderabad is suspected to be the nerve centre of militant outfit Al Qaeda's plans to launch massive activities to declare an Islamist state in India. Close to 250 youth from the city have already been explained the long-drawn strategy to spread the message of jihad and five to six sleeper cells have been put in place to attract more youth from here, sources said.

As per the counter-intelligence agencies' reports, a clutch of allied outfits including Indian Mujahideen (IM) and Lashkar e Taiba (LeT), have already begun operations in this direction. To combat this, the Union Home Ministry has all the counter-intelligence agencies including Intelligence Bureau (IB) and National Investigation Agency (NIA) forming an umbrella force.

At a meeting chaired by Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan in Raj Bhawan in Hyderabad on Friday, it was decided to deal with the situation on a priority basis. Senior officials from the NIA, IB, Telangana DGP Anurag Sharma, Hyderabad police commissioner M. Mahender Reddy and intelligence chief A.R. Anuradha were present.

It was assessed that Hyderabad is the main target of terror outfits for their recruitment and training operations in the country. From there, they may coordinate activities in Delhi, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai.

Usually, secretarial staff would be allowed to attend such meetings, but the Raj Bhawan officials have ensured that no other officials, except top policemen were present at the meeting. The NIA officials briefed the meeting about the arrest of four youth from Hyderabad in Kolkata on Sunday and the details of their confession. All of them were in the age group of 19 to 20 years.

Identities of the four youth have been kept secret, following a suggestion from Telangana CM KCR, KCR had been approached by some legislators from the MIM asking that the names of the youth not be disclosed to the media. These legislators had assured the police that the parents of the youth would fully cooperate with investigators.

Narasimhan, a former IB director, told the police that the Centre had information that more youth from the city were in touch with the terror organisations, and urged them to track them down. Both the DGP and the police commissioner gave their presentations on the recent activities of the IM and the LeT.

Police were alerted when the youth were first introduced to some social networks and then taken into closed door meetings in the city, where they were told that Islam was in great danger in India, especially after the victory of PM Modi-led BJP in the elections. They were also briefed about Al Qaeda's plans to launch an ISIS-type campaign in India within three to five years.

Four youth, who are still being grilled by police officials from Central Crime Station (CCS) in the city, have told interrogators that they were on their way to Iraq, via Bangladesh.

A Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami operative was supposed to receive them on the Bangladesh borders. But acting on a tip off, the Kolkata police arrested the youth and alerted the local unit of the NIA.

After the Governor's meeting, the city police are now set to revisit all recent cases against the local youth and call some of them in for re-interrogation. "Unlike in the past, this time we are going to interrogate the youth in the presence of either elders or lawyers and that too only during daytime," a counter-intelligence official told.

Besides, an NIA team is going to examine all the details gathered by Subedar Naik Patan Kumar, the Junior Commissioned Officer in the artillery regiment, who was arrested in August in Hyderabad for alleged espionage. Since January, Patan Kumar had sent details of around 350 senior Army officials posted in Hyderabad, Chennai and Bangalore to a person who honey-trapped him.

NIA will be looking into the likelihood of any offensive from militant outfits against these officers. Multi-level militant outfits are at work to create large scale disturbances across India. "Hyderabad is their main focus area, from where they can fan out to the surrounding states of Karnataka, Kerala and Maharashtra," the official said.