Into the paddy wagon wit' yez!
by Delhi Police for suspected links with al-Qaeda, making it the fourth arrest in its ongoing operation against the terror outfit.
Maulana Anzar Shah was arrested in Bangalore by a team of Delhi Police's Special Cell on Wednesday following which he was brought to Delhi on transit remand and produced before a court yesterday which sent him to police custody till January 20, said a police official.
In December, Delhi Police had arrested three suspected operatives of al-Qaeda module in the India sub-continent (AQIS).
While Mohammed Asif (41), the first one to be arrested, is believed to be one of the founding members and the Indian head (amir) of AQIS's motivation, recruitment and training wing, was held from Seelampur in northeast Delhi, another operative Abdul Rahman (37) was arrested from Jagatpur area of Cuttack in Odisha.
The third arrest, Zafar Masood, allegedly acted as a financier for the module. He was arrested from mohalla Deepa Sarai in UP's Sambhal district. They were all booked under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
Shah, the latest arrest in connection with the module, had met Mohammed Asif at a religious congregation in Bangalore, following which he was introduced to Abdul Rahman and Zafar Masood.
He was asked to act as a provider of logistics support whenever the need arised, said an official privy to the investigation.
The Special Cell has evidence of communication between Shah, Abdul Rehman and Zafar Masood, too, mostly carried out through Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services. The Sherlocks have also traced a money trail connecting Shah and Masood, the official said.
A few more persons are presently under the police scanner and more arrests are likely, the official added.
AQIS was floated by al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahari himself in September 2014 following a meeting somewhere in Afghanistan-Pakistain region which reportedly had in its quorum the entire Grand Council (Arabian Shura) of al-Qaeda, including al-
Zawahiri... Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as
the real brains of the outfit.Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area assuming he's not dead like Mullah Omar. He lost major face when he ordered the nascent Islamic State to cease and desist and merge with the orthodx al-Qaeda spring, al-Nusra...
's son in law.
Despite several Indians being present at the training camp, Maulana Asim Umar
...chief of al-Qaeda's Sharia Committee for Pakistain, named head of al-Qaeda in India. His video appearances are frequently accompanied by clips of al Qaeda's senior propagandist in Pakistan, Ahmad Farooq. Umar the author of
The Army of Anti-Christ: Blackwater, Documentation of the Dreadful Terrorist Activities of America's Blackwater in Islamic Countries...
alias Sanaul Haq and Mohammed Asif are believed to be the only Indians present in the council, police said.
After Umar was anointed the chief, it is believed that some unexpected visitors met him, including Indian Mujahideen
A locally recruited auxilliary of Pakistain's Lashkar-e-Taiba, designed to give a domestic patina to Pakistain's terror war against its bigger neighbor...
chief Riyaz Bhatkal, who is still on the lam, and other senior IM commanders like Baba Sajid, who was recently reported to have been killed in Syria, police said.
Asif was Umar's chosen candidate and, with the help of his deputy Qasim, Umar had contacted Asif through a social networking site, a year before he left for Tehran on a 'ziyarat' visa, exclusively meant for visiting a holy shrine in Tehran.
Umar, Asif and Qasim are all natives of Sambhal in UP, police added.