Arun Lakshman/Thiruvananthapuram
The arrest of Dr MM Akbar, the self-styled Zakir Naik of Kerala, who was apprehended at the Hyderabad airport during a brief stopover while he was flying from Australia to Qatar is seen as an important development in cracking several cases related to the migration to Islamic State from Kerala.
Akbar and his Peace school have been a recruiting ground for the IS operatives from Kerala with the Peace school manager in Kasargod and Kochi, Abdul Rasheed and his Christian converted Islamic wife, is responsible for the migration of several youngsters to Syria and Afghanistan for fighting the Islamic Caliphate.
Akbar, who has been absconding for a year and was holed up in Doha, Qatar following a lookout notice over his Peace school for following the syllabus which is not prescribed in India and for trying to radicalise young children was facing the arrest warrant. The Islamic preacher, who is credited with creating a major development in the Islamic society of Kerala with his utterings and speeches creating hatred for other religions and religious beliefs, is considered as the Zakir Naik of Kerala.He, through his numerous discourses across the state has been instrumental in dividing the society on communal lines and creating an atmosphere among Muslims of the state to live a life in Yemen and other countries like Syria and to strive and fight for the Islamic caliphate and the beliefs which were practised during the period of Prophet Mohammed. Inspired by his discourses and lectures, several youths had left home and were instrumental in converting gullible boys and girls from other religions to Islam and then using these neo-converts as fighters and concubines for IS terrorists.
Akbar who is credited to have made the Islamic cult of the state move away from the Sunni way of life which included the old beliefs like tomb worship and other practices including “Kuthu Rathib” has tried to turn these believers into Wahabi Islamic sects which do not propagate pluralism and anything which is other than Koran is given death warrant. So Akbar will have to face interrogation and will have to answer the sources of his funds and how he was able to convince and control young people so that they are being indoctrinated and forcefully migrated to countries like Afghanistan and Syria where they have to fight alongside Islamic State terrorists.
The National Investigation Agency(NIA) and the Central Intelligence Bureau have already interrogated Akbar and with the Ernakulam judicial first class magistrate directing Akbar in police custody for five days, all the central agencies can question him properly. Sources in the agencies told this correspondent that it was indeed a major breakthrough in arresting MM Akbar and that he may be in the know of full story as to how the IS operated from Kerala and what was the agenda behind the migrations from Kerala.Also, the motivating factor of these migrations will also be posed to Akbar.
It may be noted that Nimisha of Thiruvananthapuram, who got married to Bexon alias Easa another convert from Palakkad, who was converted from Christianity is somewhere in Afghanistan, according to her mother Bindu. Bindu while speaking to Organiser said, “The NIA and other agencies should probe the role played by Akbar in this IS recruitment as Abdul Rashid, the teacher of Peace International school in Kasargod is the direct link between all the 21 who went to Afghanistan and Syria were linked to him”.
Abdul Rashid had also recently sent a WhatsApp audio calling for butchering non-Islamic believers and to kill and maim by driving a truck into the festivals of Hindus. With the arrest of Akbar, the intelligence agencies will be in a position to get answers for several unanswered questions which has been plaguing the conscience of the state ever since the IS recruitment has come to light here.
The Peace International school chain has around thirteen schools in the state and what message it has given to the children who had studied from here is crystal clear. The investors of Peace school, Noor Mohammed Noor Shah (Kalliyath Group), Babu Moopen (Moopen group which runs the franchisee of Toyota cars throughout Kerala) and Siraj Mather(Mather group) are big industrialists of Kerala, and the state police seem to have forgotten them. Being the captains of big business houses the motivating factor behind their investment with Peace school run by a clandestine character like MM Akbar has also to be probed by the Indian intelligence.
Akbar during his interrogation, according to sources, has denied the Peace school having any role in conversions.However he, according to sources, has admitted that the content of the books which were taught in the school was not in accordance with the CBSE or other Indian syllabus but according to certain Islamic syllabus. It is learnt that there were portions of the books which states as to why I should be an Islam and other materials which are tantamount to other faiths and beliefs.
MM Akbar has all through his life been preaching against other religions and religious beliefs and was trying to develop an Islamic state within the state. Another Salafi preacher, Subair Mankad, had started a community living of Salfi believers at a place in Malappuram district called Athikkode, near Arikkode. There were 17 families living there under the ideals of the life led by Prophet Mohammed and his followers. Such type of community living and extreme Salafi ideals had led to such a situation wherein youth started migrating to Afghanistan and Syria to fight with Islamic terrorists of the Islamic State. Political analyst and journalist Roy Mathew while speaking to this correspondent said:” MM Akbar is one person who has corrupted and polluted the minds of Muslim youngsters with his extreme Salafi ideology and the investigating agencies have to try and get maximum out of him while the court has given him in their custody”.
In a related development senior leader of the Congress party and former state home minister and present leader of the Opposition, Ramesh Chennithala, protested the arrest of MM Akbar. The Congress leader, in a press statement, decried the arrest and it seems that even after being a former state home minister, this Congress leader failed to understand what Akbar stood for.
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