Ajit Karn
New Delhi: On Friday, a court in Delhi found four members of Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) guilty of plotting terror attacks in the country and getting people to join AQIS.
Under sections 18 (Conspiracy for Terror Act) and 18B (Recruitment for Terror Act) of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Special Judge Sanjay Khanagwal of Patiala House Court found Mohd Asif, Mohd Abdul Rehman, Zafar Masood, and Abdul Sami guilty (UAPA).
Under the UAPA, the court said that the Prosecution proved the charges against these people beyond a reasonable doubt.
On February 14, the court is likely to hear arguments about the length of the sentence. Under these sections, the maximum sentence is life in prison.
But Syed Mohd. Zeeshan Ali and Dr. Sabeel Ahmad, who were also charged, were found not guilty by the court. These people who were accused were defended by lawyers MS Khan and Qausar Khan. They said that the government hadn’t shown that they were guilty.
The judge told them they could go free if they each put up a personal bond of 10,000.
In 2017, charges were made against six people, but one of them, Syed Anzar Shah, was let go.
The Delhi police said that Rehman was in charge of a madrassa in Uttar Pradesh. He was trying to turn the young people who went there into terrorists.
It was also said that Masood was telling young people about the terror goals of the group in order to get them to join the AQIS.
Accused Asif was caught in Seelampur, Delhi, while Rehman was caught in Jagatpur, Cuttack, Odisha. Both men were caught by the Delhi police.
The Delhi police said that they thought Rehman had connections in the Middle East and Pakistan.
The Delhi police Special cell found out in December 2015 that Al-Qaeda was trying to set up a base in India under the name Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) and had named one Asim Umar as its Amir, police said.
It was also said that some young people from Western UP districts have already left India and joined the group’s ranks in Pakistan, and that one of the group’s groups is active in the UP district of Sambhal.
During the investigation, it was found that a man named Mohd. Asif, who lives in Deepa Sarai, Sambhal, UP, has been to Iran and Turkey and is involved in strange activities. So, sources were made stronger in the Sambhal, UP, area.
Mohd. Asif, the head of AQIS in India, was caught by a team from the Special Cell on December 14, 2015.
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Because of what he said, on December 15, 2015, Zafar Masood @ Guddu was arrested in Sambhal, UP, and on December 16, 2015, Mohd. Abdul Rehman was arrested in Cuttack, Odisha.
Mohd. Abdul Rehman went to Pakistan without permission and met terrorists there, like Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and Sajid, who were both wanted for their roles in the 26/11 Mumbai Terror Attacks.
Then, on January 17, 2016, accused Abdul Sami, who lived in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, was caught in Mewat, Haryana. He learned to be a terrorist in Pakistan.
During the investigation, Delhi police also said that the names of accused Syed Mohd. Zeeshan Ali and Dr. Sabeel Ahmad came up as part of a plot to help the members of AQIS in UAE with money and supplies.
The accused Syed Mohd. Zeeshan Ali was sent back to Pakistan from the UAE in 2017 and then arrested in this case. The accused Dr. Sabeel Ahmad was sent back to Pakistan in 2020.
Delhi police said that Sabeel was first arrested in a terror case in Bengaluru, Karnataka, from IGI Airport in Delhi. Later, he was arrested in this case.
