Kerala men who left to join IS are ex-PFI workers

KOZHIKODE: Two peope from Kannur who left the country allegedly to join the Islamic State (IS) in Afghanistan last month are former workers of Popular Front of India (PFI).
Police said K Sajjad and Anwar Poothappara went missing along with their families on November 19 after they told relatives they were going to Mysuru. T P Nisam, another youth from Kuruva in Kannur, also has been reported missing and is believed to have joined the group.
Sajjad has gone with wife Shahina and two children and Anwar with wife Afsila and three children.Police said they went to UAE on November 20 and from there to Iran. It is believed the group has sneaked into IS areas in Afghanistan.
PFI sources said Anwar had severed ties with the organisation eight years ago after he went to the Gulf. Sajjad was ousted from the organisation three years ago for 'financial irregularity', the sources added.
Nisam was a regular visitor to a Salafi mosque now managed by an extreme Salafi group, police said. He has raised questions on certain religious issues to the Salafi preachers. Some controversial Salafi preachers are associated with the mosque, whose speeches had led to widespread protest in Kerala.
Anwar is co-brother of Muhammad Shameer T K, the PFI division-level leader from Pappinassery, believed to have been killed in Syria along with his two children. Shameer, who left for Syria in 2015, is suspected to be the motivator for the group from Kannur which joined the IS last year.
According to charge-sheet filed by National Investigating Agency in the Kannur IS case, it was Shameer who motivated others, including PFI workers Abdul Razak, Mithilaj, Rashid, Abdul Manaf, Muhammad Shajil and Abdul Khayoom, to join the terrorist outfit.
Police suspect that though Shameer is dead, some others are using the connections he had in Kannur to inspire people to join the IS. Shameer and his group went to Syria to join the IS, but the 10 people who left last month may have gone to Afghanistan as the IS strongholds in Syria have been destroyed in the war.