Inter-state ‘love jihad' racket busted, 10 operatives held
The breakthrough led to a coordinated crackdown and the arrest of 10 operatives across six states, including fresh arrests on Saturday, police said.
Two men, Shekhar Roy and Osama from Kolkata, allegedly trapped and converted the two sisters.
Their arrest led to the unravelling of the wider network and the subsequent arrest of SB Krishna from Goa, Rehman Qureshi from Agra, Mohammed Ali, Junaid Qureshi, and Ali from Jaipur, Abu Talib from Muzaffarnagar, Manoj from Delhi, and Abur Rehman from Dehradun.
An Agra court has remanded all the accused to police custody for ten days.
UP DGP Rajeev Krishna told reporters in Lucknow that the network operated using "love jihad" tactics, online radicalisation, and foreign funding from Canada, the USA, Dubai, and London.
"The network was funnelling money through the dark web and adopting tactics resembling the signature style of ISIS," he said.
"In the past, under this mission, UP ATS arrested Umar Gautam and Mufti Jahangir Alam in 2021 for running a pan-India religious conversion racket.
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Both were sentenced to life imprisonment in 2024," said a senior police official.
Agra Police Commissioner Deepak Kumar, told reporters in Lucknow that the investigation began after an FIR was lodged in March regarding the sisters' disappearance.
"When we dug deeper, a pan-India syndicate surfaced. Forty-five teams were sent to Goa, West Bengal, Delhi, Uttarakhand, and Rajasthan, based on surveillance," he said.
"We made arrests and found that the network allegedly targeted vulnerable women through emotional manipulation, promoted radicalisation via curated content, and facilitated conversions with necessary documentation. It provided safe houses, managed foreign funds from Canada and the US, and offered operational support, including new phones, SIM cards, legal assistance, and internal communication channels," added Kumar.
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