UP Anti-Terrorist Squad nabs two for plotting to incite communal discord
The UP ATS, initially detained Ajmal Ali, 19, from Amroha in western UP on August 2 for questioning. Based on Ajmal's grilling, his mentor, Usama Maj Sheikh, 24, was picked up from Thane on August 3. The ATS arrested both Ajmal and Usama officially on Monday.
The ATS sources claimed that sustained electronic surveillance and intelligence inputs led them to uncover a WhatsApp group named "Reviving Islam" with over 400 members, including three group administrators. The majority of the group members were reportedly based in Pakistan, while one mobile number linked to the group was traced to a UP resident.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
2 hours ago
- Time of India
9 of solver gang arrested from Haldwani hotel over SSC exam cheating racket
Nainital: Nine men have been arrested from a hotel in Haldwani for allegedly attempting to manipulate the Staff Selection Commission (SSC) online examinations by using remote desktop software to solve questions for paying candidates, police said on Monday, adding that laptops, mobile phones, Wi-Fi dongles, and other electronic equipment were seized from them during Sunday night's raid. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The accused were operating from a hotel in Talli Bamori, where they planned to link exam centre systems to a remote setup controlled by an IT expert in Delhi. The group used remote-access software to take control of candidate terminals during exams held from July 26 to Aug 1. Police said the gang collected admit cards through WhatsApp, assigned solvers to sit at exam centres, and remotely answered questions in real time. Each candidate was charged Rs 4 lakh. Senior superintendent of police (SSP) Prahlad Narayan Meena said, "They were caught before they could carry out the plan. Remote access software and digital gadgets used for cheating were recovered." An FIR has been registered at Haldwani police station under BNS sections 318(4), 319(2), and 3(5) and section 66D of the Information Technology Act. The seized digital equipment is being sent for forensic analysis. Two accused, Parvinder Singh and Sunil Kumar, confessed to devising the plan to repay personal debts. In Dec 2024, they leased the GyanKosh Digital Library in Manpur West, Haldwani, from a Dehradun-based owner to run the operation. Solvers based in Delhi were to access exam systems and transmit answers to candidates. Their original attempt failed after library employee Himanshu Bisht refused to allow unauthorised laptop installations, prompting the gang to shift to the hotel. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The arrested are Ramakant Sharma alias Rahul from Bulandshahr, Abhishek Kumar and Shiv Singh from Hathras, Sunil Kumar and Parvinder Kumar from Baghpat, Vishal Giri from Meerut/Haridwar, Aftab Khan and Arun Kumar from Muzaffarnagar, and Jasveer Singh from Rohtak. Police said some posed as invigilators, others handled logistics, tech setup, and payments. The SSC has faced repeated scrutiny over cheating and paper leaks. In July 2025, protests erupted in Delhi demanding reforms and stricter oversight of digital exams.
Time of India
2 hours ago
- Time of India
UP ATS arrests two, including ‘doc'from Thane, for Ghazwa-e-Hind plot
Lucknow: The Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) of Uttar Pradesh arrested a doctor identified as Usama Maj Sheikh (24) from Badlapur in Maharashtra. Sheikh, who claims to be a homeopathy practitioner, was taken into custody from his residence in Badlapur East on Monday morning with the assistance of the local police. Earlier on August 2, ATS had arrested Ajmal Ali (19) from UP's Amroha. The ATS said that both accused were in contact with several Pakistani individuals through social media and were part of a larger online network aimed at indoctrinating Indian Muslim youth. Their objective, according to the preliminary findings of ATS, was to incite communal hatred, provoke religious animosity, and prepare ground for a violent movement to establish Ghazwa-e-Hind—an Islamist concept of religious conquest—by spreading Sharia law through jihad. The duo allegedly influenced and provoked young Muslim men to harbour resentment against non-Muslims, encouraging them to join anti-national and criminal activities aimed at destabilising the country, the ATS added. Ajmal was first summoned to the ATS headquarters in Lucknow for questioning where he revealed to have been in touch with his mentor Sheikh and several others in Pakistan. Based on the findings, UP ATS registered an FIR at ATS police station in Lucknow. Ajmal was arrested and produced before a court, which sent him to judicial custody. Following further leads, the ATS also tracked down Usama Maj Sheikh and placed him under arrest on August 4 from his residence in Badlapur, Maharashtra. Under tight security, Sheikh was produced before the Ulhasnagar court, which granted a transit remand. He was brought into custody and is being interrogated further regarding his role in the ideological indoctrination and recruitment of radical youth for extremist objectives, the ATS said. The ATS sources said they are trying to identify other members of the network, including possible foreign handlers and local collaborators. Digital evidence retrieved from seized mobile phones and social media accounts is being forensically analysed. More arrests are likely in the coming days.
News18
3 hours ago
- News18
Maulana Chhangur & The Kerala Story: When the Real Submits A Thousand Proofs For The Reel
Last Updated: Even in the face of a million denials, there is no escape from the truth: the demographic war against Hindu-majority India has intensified Nations change. But nations change beyond all recognition when they put a simple flowchart in motion on the ground: Demographic takeover. Denial. Destiny. India, which has already lost two limbs at the time of Independence precisely because of a demographic war being waged against it for about a thousand years, still has several organs under threat not just from unchecked illegal immigration but deliberate and planned conversion. Love jihad, or luring young non-Muslim women to marry, convert, and lend their wombs to the cause of spreading Islam, is one such weapon which India's liberal elite insist on being in denial. But the Maulana Chhangur case and hundreds of other such instances point to society rushing to its dark destiny simply because of this denial. The warning signs are in front of us in plain sight, written across mainstream and social media. Maulana Jalaluddin, also known as Chhangur Baba, reportedly converted more than 1,500 young Hindu women to Islam. They were lured, trapped, and converted through psychological and financial manipulation. Rs 106 crore was found on him, a bungalow worth Rs 3 crore, exotic horses. Money flowed in through Nepal banks from Pakistan, Saudi, UAE, Turkey and other countries. The Maulana, his son Mehboob, and associates Naveen Rohra alias Jamaluddin and Neetu Rohra alias Nasreen were arrested by the Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) and are in jail. Foreign funds now estimated at Rs 500 crore came through more than 40 bank accounts, some allegedly opened in the names of non-Muslim converts. The ED has registered a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to probe the financial network and track the money trail. Shri V.S. Achuthanandan was among the first leaders to bravely expose the dangerous plot of turning Kerala into an Islamic territory through tactics like murder, money power, and love thank him for his courage. ॐ शांति। #Kerala #VSachuthanandan #LoveJihad — Pratheesh Viswanath (@pratheesh_Hind) July 21, 2025 The syndicate allegedly employed a structured approach using 'love traps', blackmail, and foreign funding to lure chiefly Hindu women into converting to Islam. The Organiser reported that coded language such as 'project" (for targeted girls), 'kajal karna" (for brainwashing), and 'deedar karna" (for introducing victims to Chhangur) were used. Chhangur Baba and his aide Neetu alias Nasreen were arrested in Lucknow on July 5. The ED raided and demolished parts of an illegally constructed complex linked to Maulana Chhangur in Balrampur. It now believes that the network had spread to Uttarakhand as well. The case of Maulana Chhangur is hardly an isolated one. In Uttar Pradesh's Deoria district, three separate cases of love jihad targeting minor Hindu girls have been traced recently, exposing the same dangerous pattern of entrapment, grooming, abduction, and forced religious conversion. The case of Maulana Kaleem Siddiqui, who ran a conversion empire very similar to Maulana Chhangur and was arrested by the UP ATS in 2021, is still fresh in memory. Recently, another chilling case of love jihad and systematic abuse was reported from Musakhedi, Indore. A young Muslim man, Zeeshan, posed as a Hindu named Abhishek Thakur to lure and exploit a Hindu girl. Members of a Hindu organisation stormed a rented room and caught the accused. The girl had allegedly been drugged and subjected to repeated abuse for nearly five years. But greed for minority votes in Indian politics and whitewashing the crimes of radical Islam as a prerequisite of being a 'liberal' in our society run so deep that even in the face of almost daily evidence that some politicians and so-called liberals were outraged when The Kerala Story recently got two national awards. The film is about women from Kerala who are pressured into converting to Islam and joining the Islamic State. A character, Shalini Unnikrishnan (Adah Sharma), converts, changes her name to Fatima Ba, and gets imprisoned in Afghanistan after joining ISIS. The movie got awards for Best Director for Sudipto Sen and Best Cinematography. There was an immediate chorus about the film being 'divisive" and portraying the 'non-issue" of love jihad, led by chief minister of Kerala Pinarayi Vijayan. Ironically, the phrase 'love jihad' was born in Kerala. Far from being anti-minority, it was popularised by the Church in the state. The Kerala Catholic Bishops' Council (KCBC) claimed around 2009 that over 2,600 young Christian women had been converted to Islam since 2006. The KCBC's Vigilance Commission for Social Harmony urged Christians to be vigilant against such traps and conversion. Former Kerala CM VS Achuthanandan had bluntly raised the issue and the imminent threat to Kerala's demographics as well, detailing out the mode of operation of the Islamist conversion syndicates. Even in the face of a million denials, there is no escape from the truth: the demographic war against Hindu-majority India has intensified. If Bharat allows itself to lose in another round of the continuing demographic war, there will be nothing left to argue, as Sharia is not a great fan of spirited intellectual arguments. Abhijit Majumder is a senior journalist. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18's views. view comments Location : New Delhi, India, India First Published: August 04, 2025, 19:55 IST News opinion Opinion | Maulana Chhangur & The Kerala Story: When the Real Submits A Thousand Proofs For The Reel Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
