Keralites in SIMI crack commando team?

The SIMI or the Student Islamic Movement of India has formed a crack commando team of 200 men, the all India president of the organisation Safdar Nagori has reportedly confessed to the investigating officers.

He also told the interrogators that of this team around 30 are from Kerala and that he had paid several visits to the State along with the SIMI leaders from the State.

SIMI national secretary Shibili who was also arrested with Narogi is from Erattupettah in Kottayam district and according to sources in the intelligence agencies is suspected to be the master brain behind the Mumbai train blasts in which around 200 people were killed and several others injured.

The SIMI leader has confessed that the Keralite youth who were recruited for the crack commando team were filtered from several others and were subjected to grueling physical and mental endurance tests.

The SIMI, according to sources ,was in direct touch with the Taliban leader Mullah Ommer and the crack team was to be used to fight in Afghanistan on his command.

The recent police raid on the residence of the arrested SIMI leader Shibili has recovered some important documents, top sources in the State police told The Pioneer. However his father Abdul Kareem and even the women folk of the house have not disclosed anything. Abdul Kareem is actively involved with the Islamic movement NDF and he is a sought after Arabic typist after retiring as a teacher from an Upper Primary school in Erattupettah.

According to the intelligence sources around 300 youth in and around Kottayam district has received high level training from Shibili who is in the cause of Islamic terror movement for the past several years after graduating from Thiruvananthapuram Engineering College .

Another software engineer Yahiya alias Kammukutty a native of Mukkam was recently arrested in Bangalore following his involvement in running terror camps in the forest areas around Hubli .Yahiya is also in the rolls of SIMI.

The police and the investigating agencies are tight lipped on the penetration level achieved by the organisation in the State and the reported confession of the national president of 30-odd Kerala youth in the elite squad of the SIMI is a clear indicator that the organisation has deep roots in the State.

Intelligence sources told The Pioneer that SIMI is employing endurance tests including over five minutes stay in under water , stay in congested tunnel with several others and other mental tests .A 30 km non-stop walk is also in the physical training programme for the youth who join SIMI.

Sources also told The Pioneer that the organisation is heavily funded and that they are not the offshoots of Pakistan based terror outfits like LeT but has direct links with the Afghan-based terror groups.

An elite team of the external intelligence agency (RAW) is in Kerala and has conducted studies on the forest tracts in the State with emphasis on the forest land bordering Tamil Nadu on the reported camps conducted by the outlawed organisation.

The team is also probing several areas of Mukkam and other parts of Kozhikode and is trying to garner more details on the arrested Pakistani citizen Fahad who have close relatives in Kozhikode. The contacts of Yahiya ,Fahad and Shibili is also being probed into.

The Department of Revenue Intelligence is also being roped into the investigation following tips that the organisation is widely involved in circulating counterfeit Indian currency in many parts of the State and the country .The agencies are also trying to find out the role played by Basheer who was the former president of SIMI and is a wanted Jihadi for several international policing agencies .Basheer hails from Aluva and Shibili’s brother Shaduli was arrested by the police trying to circulate some leaflets of SIMI in Aluva a couple of years before.

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