By Shafeeq Hudawi, Twocircles.net
Ever since the news of her son’s arrest broke out, Safiya has had little to do apart from waiting for her phone to ring, and hoping that by some miracle she will receive some good news about her Mouinudheen Parakkadavath. Mouinudheen was arrested by National Investigation Agency (NIA) on February 14 for allegedly being part of an IS module. When she attended Twocircles.net’s call at their residence at Kanhangad in Kasargod district, Safiya was eager to know about her son. She handed over the phone to her husband Abdulla Theruvath when she realised that we did not have any good news to convey to her.
“We received information from NIA after he was taken to custody in New Delhi. After that, we have had no information about him. But the local news is trying to make it sound like we have deliberately hidden information about our family,” a worried Abdulla said.
Abdulla and Safiya were praying for Mouinudheen after NIA informed that their son was associated with people connected to the Islamic State. On October 2, 2016, five youths-Manseed from Kannur district, Swalih Mohammed from Thrissur district, Safwan P from Malappuram district and Jasim NK and Ramshad Nageelan from Kozhikode district were arrested by NIA from Kanakamala, a small hill station in Kannur for allegedly being in touch with IS.
Abdulla says that his son was not involved with any terror activity. “I am sure that my son wouldn’t be in touch with any kind of such groups. No one from my family has taken such radical steps and I see no reason why he would do so,” he says.
Mouinudheen, according to Abdulla, was brought to Delhi by Indian embassy after he was taken into custody by the Abu Dhabi police. “I got call from NIA saying my son was in touch with IS sympathisers two months back. I handed them his contact as the officers said they wanted to just question him and assured me that Mouinudheen was not in trouble,” he said.
Abdulla believes that NIA got him arrested by the Abu Dhabi police.
“My son told me that he was not involved in such activities while he called me from Abu Dhabi jail,” he said.
In a press release issued after his arrest, the NIA alleged that the youngsters arrested from Kanakamala received money from Mouinudheen.
Mouinudheen, who stopped his education in 10th standard, was taken to Abu Dhabi by his brothers Mahmood and Rasheed about six years ago. He was working as a salesman in the computer sales shop, run by the two brothers.
“The case relates to a terror module in which a group of youths from Kerala including some members based in the Middle-East, hatched a conspiracy as per the instructions from their online ISIS handlers. On 2nd October, 2016 based on the intelligence inputs, five accused, associated with this terror module, were arrested from Kanakmala Hill in Kannoor district, Kerala and another associate was arrested from Calicut the same day. Based on their revelation, it was established that Mouinudheen was a key figure in the module, which was actively planning various aspects of terrorist plot, on a Telegram group. Mouinudheen was using the online identity Abu-Al-Indonesi as well as Ibn Abdullah, on the telegram group. It was also revealed by the arrested persons that Mouinudheen had sent funds from Abu Dhabi to members of the terrorist module in Kerala, for purposes of the conspiracy, through Western Union Money Transfer, last year,” says the NIA release.
“He will not deliberately get involved in an organisation like IS. He must have fallen into the trap if he did so, but we need to know the truth,” Abdulla added.
The parents are as of now waiting for their son to be presented before the NIA Special Court in Kochi. “We have not initiated any steps towards helping our son simply because we don’t know what to do as we are left with no information about him,” he said.