Ten alleged Jaish OGW's arrested by State Investigation Agency

The SIA, which was constituted recently with a mandate to investigate crimes connected with terrorism and secessionism, conducted overnight raids to focus on the network of JeM at 10 different locations in various districts of south and central Kashmir, said the investigating agency in an official statement.

Kashmir (Jammu and Kashmir): The State Investigation Agency (SIA) on Wednesday arrested at least ten overground workers (OGW) of the outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) during raids at different locations in the Kashmir valley. These OGWs were part of the terror modules and were taking instructions from their commanders.

The SIA, which was constituted recently with a mandate to investigate crimes connected with terrorism and secessionism, conducted overnight raids to focus on the network of JeM at 10 different locations in various districts of south and central Kashmir, said the investigating agency in an official statement.

The module with its members as part of sub-modules operated in the form of verticals to escape the eyes of enforcement agencies, with the strategy that in the event of detection of one member the bigger network does not get compromised. "The module was tracked through discreet surveillance in which corroborative intelligence capable of being converted to admissible evidence in court was used to ascertain and confirm the involvement of the terrorists," said the official statement, adding that the module could be connected to others through higher levels of JeM leadership.

It was also stated by the officials that the module had been active in recruiting youth, besides arranging finances, transporting weapons in the south and central Kashmir along with other logistic support.

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In the searches, cell phones, SIM cards, records to show the use of banking channels, and even a dummy pistol were seized, the statement stated. The arrested terrorists were mostly recruiting vulnerable school and college-going students as a few of them are students themselves, said the SAI in its statement, adding that they were in close connection with the regular terrorists of the JeM outfit and had been under surveillance for quite some time.

Arrested terrorists included one at whose house four JeM operatives had been killed on April 4, 2020.

The digital records seized is being sent to FSL for evidence analysis and the detailed terrorists would be presented before the NIA court in Srinagar to seek permission for custodial questioning.

It is believed the arrests and subsequent follow-up investigation would dent the upper ground network of JeM and degrade its ability to undertake terror activities across the valley, it added.