Thane: NIA raid at home of SIMI man’s son yields mobiles, hard drives

Shamil Nachan

In a significant operation, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) conducted a raid on Thursday at the residence of Shamil Nachan, son of Saquib Nachan, a former member of SIMI, an arrested accused in the Pune ISIS module case, located in Thane. The search yielded a trove of compelling materials that lay bare the sinister conspiracy of the terrorist organisation to disrupt the nation's peace and communal harmony.

Located in Padgha, Thane, the raided house of Shamil, a member of an ISIS Sleeper Cell, yielded a collection of mobile phones, hard disks, handwritten documents, and more. "These items are currently under examination and analysis. Shamil had previously been apprehended for his involvement in bomb (IED) assembly & training workshops and the creation and testing of improvised explosive devices (IEDs)," NIA has said.

Working in collaboration with five other accused individuals - Zulfikar Ali Barodawala, Mohammed Imran Khan, Mohammed Yunus Saki, Simab Nasiruddin Kazi, and Abdul Kadir Pathan - Shamil orchestrated a broader conspiracy aimed at triggering violence in various parts of the country through the fabrication and detonation of IEDs. Two of the absconding members, Imran and Yunus, who were on the NIA's 'most wanted' list, were recently apprehended by the Pune division for their involvement in a case concerning the discovery of explosives in a Rajasthan-based vehicle in April 2022.

The ongoing NIA investigation into the Pune ISIS module case has uncovered that Shamil and his cohorts from the ISIS Sleeper Cell assembled IEDs at a residence in Kondhwa, Pune. This location also served as a venue for organising and participating in bomb (IED) assembly & training workshops last year. The accused even carried out a controlled explosion at this site to assess the functionality of a self-fabricated IED.

The overarching objective of this conspiracy was to execute acts of terrorism with the aim of destabilising the peace and communal harmony within the nation. "The arrested individuals harboured intentions to wage war against the Government of India, aligning with the ISIS agenda to propagate terror and violence in the pursuit of establishing an Islamic State within the country," the NIA statement reads.

ISIS, known by various aliases such as Islamic State (IS), Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Daish, Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP), ISIS Wilayat Khorasan, and Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham Khorasan (ISIS-K), has consistently pursued an anti-India agenda by orchestrating acts of terror across the country.