Six Jihadis Convicted by NIA Court in Guwahati

                                                                                                                                                                                                    Dibya Bordoloi

The Jihadis were planning terrorist activities in pursuance of jihadi ideology in Assam and Northeast. 

Guwahati: Six militants of the Bangladesh-based Islamic terror outfit Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen (JMB), who were arrested in the Barpeta district of Assam in 2019, have been convicted by an NIA special court in Guwahati on Tuesday.

The convicted militants are Hafizur Rahman, Yaqub Ali, Shariful Islam, Mustafur Rahman, Hafiz Shafiqur Islam and Azharuddin Ahmed from Barpeta in 2019. All convicted are associated with the JMB Assam module.

In January 2020, a charge sheet was filed against them. It was mentioned in the NIA charge sheet that they were involved in anti-national activities.

During their arrest, the NIA recovered weapons and ammunition along with Jihadi literature from them. The Jihadis were planning terrorist activities in pursuance of jihadi ideology in Assam and Northeast. NIA sources said it was confirmed during the agency's probe that all the six convicted militants were Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen (JMB) members, a terror organization proscribed in India and Bangladesh.

As per the conviction order by the special NIA court in Guwahati, under the Arms Act, the self-styled commander of JMB, Assam Hafizur Rahman, was sentenced to 2 years and five months imprisonment and was slapped a fine of Rs. 1000. The NIA court sentenced another accused to two years in prison.

As per sources, these six trained JMB members had connections with JMB Jihadi Sahanur Alom. Sahanur Alom recruited them to organise Islamic terrorist activities in Assam. NIA earlier arrested Sahanur Alom in connection with Burdwan, West Bengal blast case on October 10, 2014.

Alom was taken to his native village in the Barpeta district of Assam for further investigation. The investigating agency learned about the JMB Assam module from Sahanur Alom's confessions. With the inputs from Sahanur Alom, NIA conducted a detailed investigation in Assam and busted the JMB Assam module and arrested at least 6 of the terror outfit's trained members.