NIA affixes two floors of a Pune school that PFI uses for camps.

The banned PFI, according to the NIA, used two floors of a Pune school building to radicalize Muslim students and plot terrorist attacks. The school’s headmaster denied any involvement with the confiscated floors. The two floors had earlier been searched by the NIA, which had collected evidence-related documents. In September 2022, the PFI was deemed an illegal association. In a second operation, Maharashtra ATS detained five members of the organization’s office, alleging that the group intended to turn India into an Islamic state by 2047.

The Popular Front of India (PFI), a banned organization, is accused of organizing camps “to radicalize and indoctrinate Muslim youth and train them for carrying out targeted killings and attacks against leaders and organizations of a particular community,” according to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), which on Sunday seized two floors of a school building in Pune.

NIA affixes two floors of a Pune school that PFI uses for camps.
NIA affixes two floors of a Pune school that PFI uses for camps.
The agency’s seizure of the floors, according to the school’s principal, was incorrect, and the media was given false information.

The PFI allegedly used the fourth and fifth floors of the Blue Bell School building to plot terrorist attacks with the intention of jeopardizing India’s unity, integrity, and security.

In a communiqué on Monday, the PFI claimed that it had “recruited innocent Muslim youth and given them both armed and unarmed training to eliminate those opposed to the establishment of Islamic rule in the country by 2047.”

In a case the NIA had registered in Delhi on April 13, 2022, the two floors have been attached as “proceeds of terrorism” under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. On March 18, the agency submitted a chargesheet to the special NIA court in Delhi, listing 20 defendants, including the PFI.

At Kondhwa Budruk, Blue Bells High School and Junior College is housed in the K Z Knowledge Center building. Shaukat Ali Shaikh, who passed away in 2009, established the school.

There is no relationship between our school, which is located on the second and third floors, and the action taken by the NIA, according to school principal Reshma Fazalekarim Shaikh. Our school’s building hasn’t been taken, then. The K Z Knowledge Center’s entire structure is rented out, and the agency’s floors were held in trust, the details of which I am unsure.

Following “continued inputs and evidence that the PFI was involved in funding terrorist activities, organizing training camps for providing armed training, and radicalizing people to join banned organizations,” the release stated that the NIA had searched the homes and offices of top PFI leaders and members at 93 locations in 15 states, including Maharashtra, on September 22 of last year. It also stated that 45 people had been arrested.

Incriminating documents were also unearthed during the agency’s investigation of the school’s two floors, which “revealed that the said property was used by the accused, found to be associated with the PFI, for organizing arms training for its cadre,” according to the NIA statement.

“The training camps were used as forums to stir defenseless Muslim youth against the government, as well as against figures from that community’s leaders and organizations. In order to engage in terrorist actions, the camps were also utilized to stoke their passions and prod them into accepting a violent kind of jihad.

In addition, it was said in the press release that “the newly recruited PFI cadre were trained in the use of dangerous weapons for attacking and murdering prominent leaders who opposed the group’s ideology of establishing an Islamic rule in India.”

The accused—all senior PFI cadre/national executive committee members—were found to have participated in a criminal conspiracy to “establish Caliphate and Islamic rule in India by waging war against the country and overthrowing the democratically elected government,” the press release continued.

In accordance with the UAPA, the PFI was deemed a “illegal association” in September 2022.

In a separate operation, the Maharashtra anti-terrorism team had detained five officers of the outlawed group on September 22 of last year. They were Moinuddin Gulam Hussain alias Momin Mistry, 38, Mohammad Iqbal Mohammad Ibrahim Khan, 38, Shaikh Sadiq Isaq Qureshi, 42, and Mohammed Aasif Aminul Hussain Khan Adhikari, 46.

The five were named in a chargesheet submitted by the ATS on February 2 alleging that the group intended to “turn India into an Islamic state by 2047, when the country will celebrate 100 years of independence.”

The ATS asserted that a document with the heading “India 2047: Towards Rules of Islam in India” that was reportedly discovered in the electronic device of one of the defendants, Mazhar Khan, set forth the conspiracy.