The Islamic State (IS) mouthpiece Dabiq’s latest story on ‘The Revival of Jihad in Bengal’ has set the alarm bells ringing in this part of the world, especially in the light of 13 November Paris attacks carried out by the outfit. Just how serious is its threat to West Bengal and the rest of India?
In October, West Bengal was alarmed after threat posters of the IS were found in its two districts – Murshidabad and Nadia. And now, the state police and central intelligence agencies are on tenterhooks with the latest issue (12th) of IS’s online propaganda magazine Dabiq.
Besides, claiming responsibility for the murders of Italian aid worker, Cesare Tavella and Japanese national Kunio Hoshi in Dhaka and Rangpur respectively in Bangladesh, the IS claims that the global terror outfit is busy preparing for further attacks on Bangladesh and the soldiers of the so-called Caliphate continue to rise and expand in ‘Bengal’, and continue to terrorise. Though by ‘Bengal’, the IS has meant Bangladesh, the important question that arises is how far its immediate neighbour West Bengal and India as a whole, are susceptible to IS influence and attack?
“The influence of the IS ideology is visible. A large number of posters were recovered from 17 villages of Murshidabad and Nadia districts a few months ago. Pasted on the walls in these villages, these exhorted the youth to join the IS, promote its ideology and ‘fight for the cause’. The IS wants local youth, including girls, between 16 and 30 years to get radicalised and start local jihad at the places to which they belong. It’s like outsourcing of terror,” an intelligence agency official told , on condition of anonymity.
“A few among the large number of unrecognised madarsas at remote places, particularly in the districts of West Bengal bordering Bangladesh, have become safe havens for strategising terror activities, including making improvised explosive devices (IEDs),” the official claimed.
Ansar-ut Tawhid fi Bilad al-Hind (AuT), an India-specific jihadi outfit that pledged allegiance to IS in September 2014, has started online propaganda for IS in Bengali. Prior to this, it had posted messages with Urdu, Hindi, Tamil, Gujarati and English subtitles.
The cyber cell of the Intelligence Bureau conducted a national survey to mark the areas from where the IS are trying to recruit youths. According to the survey, Howrah in West Bengal is the fourth city after Srinagar, Guwahati and Chinchwad (a suburb of Pune) where youth between 16 and 30, have shown online interest in IS.
According to Intelligence agency sources, the operators of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), despite a crackdown, has a strong network in West Bengal, and they may be indirectly helping the IS to spread their influence in the state both for indoctrination and recruitment through social media.
Strategic expert Ajai Sahni said, “The IS is not coming here. Like, Al-Qaeda in the past, it’s the brand ‘IS’ that is attracting the youth who want to associate with it. Whether in West Bengal or any other part of India, radical groups — such as the Students Islamic Movement of India (Simi), Indian Mujahideen or remnants of JMB — could be behind activities like putting up IS posters. Chances are that locals could be undertaking such activities to create sensation. There’s a potential danger in this and it can’t be ignored. Simultaneously, the threat of IS shouldn’t be exaggerated, but we need to be ready.”
“In Bangladesh, the present government has taken stringent action against strong radical groups. Now, many highly-radicalised but leaderless groups are forming new small groups. To seek publicity, they are showing allegiance to IS. There is ambiguity as far as West Bengal is concerned regarding the presence or activities of the IS. A fact-based assessment is required,” added Sahni, executive director, Institute for Conflict Management.
There is a close link between Bangladesh and West Bengal on terror activities, and the latter was used by JMB as a base for launching attacks on Bangladesh. After the blasts at Khagragarh in Burdwan in 2014, the NIA during its investigation had gathered that JMB’s first branch at Lalgola in Murshidabad district was set up in mid-2005 by the outfit’s chief Sheikh Abdur Rehman and the second-in-command Siddiqul Islam alias ‘Bangla Bhai’ provided training for three months to local youth “to carry out jihad”. Both Rehman and Bangla Bhai are among the six to whom a Bangladesh court gave the death sentence.
Counter-terrorism analyst Anil Kamboj compared the manufacturing of local shoes in Agra that are spuriously branded ‘Bata’, with the India-based terror outfits or JMB faction associating itself with the IS brand to “add glamour and gain big publicity”.
He added, “There is no presence or direct entry of the IS in India at present. But by using the brand of IS, the local outfits or groups formed by terrorists infiltrated from Bangladesh want to create disturbances in parts of the country. Putting up of IS posters in Bengal may be one such example. The situation is not only alarming in Bengal, but also in Assam, and the latter is more vulnerable.
There are sleeper cells those can get activated with instructions from Pakistan. Out of large number of illegal madarsas those came up from 2005 onwards in West Bengal for providing teaching to Muslim children, a few have harboured terror activities and have become centres for the radicalisation of youth.”