Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, March 19: Twelve National Executive Council (NEC) members of the outlawed organisation Popular Front of India (PFI) are among the 19 persons who have been charged by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) for participating in a plot to wage war in order to create an Islamic Caliphate in the nation.
A NIA spokeswoman was reported by PTI as stating that with the submission of the chargesheet in the Delhi case on Saturday, the total number of defendants charged in PFI cases nationwide by the federal agency now stands at 105.
The National Development Front (NDF) of Kerala and the Karnataka Forum for Dignity (KFD) merged to form the PFI in 2006, with Oma Salam serving as its chairman, EM Abdul Rahiman as vice-chairman, VP Nazaruddin as national secretary, and Anees Ahmed as national general secretary of the NEC, the organization’s top decision-making body.
Salam, Rahiman, Nazaruddin, Ahmed, Afsar Pasha, E Abubacker, Professor P Koya, and Mohammed Ali Jinnah were among the 19 defendants named in the charge sheet filed in accordance with different provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and the Indian Criminal Code.
Abdul Wahid Sait, AS Ismail, Mohd Yusuf, Mohammed Basheer, Shafeer KP, Jaseer KP, Shahid Nasir, Waseem Ahmed, Mohammed Shakif, Muhammad Farooq Ur Rahman, and Yasar Arafat alias Yasir Hasan are some more prominent NEC members whose names appear on the chargesheet. After a statewide sweep at 39 sites, including PFI offices, the organisation was detained after the Ministry of Home Affairs outlawed them in September of last year.
“The case, under investigation since April 2022, has revealed that a criminal conspiracy was hatched by the PFI to divide the country on communal lines. It has also come to light that the ultimate objective of the conspiracy was to overthrow the existing system of secular and democratic governance in India and replace it with an Islamic Caliphate,” PTI quoted the spokesperson as saying.
The NIA claims that its investigations have also revealed a PFI financial trail that led to the organization’s terrorist agents and weapon trainers all throughout the nation. The payments were made under the pretence of paying wages both in cash and through routine bank transfers.
All of these PFI trainers have been taken into custody as a result of cases that have been reported to the NIA or other state police agencies. Also, the NIA has frozen 40 bank accounts belonging to 19 people connected to PFI in addition to 37 bank accounts owned by the PFI organisation, thereby restricting the organization’s ability to raise money.
