In their remand reports submitted to multiple courts across India on Thursday, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) have levelled a slew of charges against the Popular Front of India.
On Thursday, in a coordinated operation across 15 states and one Union territory, NIA, ED, and state police forces carried out raids NIA by itself raided 93 locations with 300 officers and arrested 45 PFI leaders and cadres, including some of its top leadership and country’s tall Muslim figures.
In a remand report filed in Kerala, the anti-terror agency said that PFI was conspiring to engage in unlawful activities by “by creating enmity between members of different religions and groups, prejudicial to maintenance of harmony, with intention to disrupt public tranquillity and cause disaffection against India.”
The remand report even stated that the Muslim group also propagates an “alternative justice delivery system justifying the use of criminal force causing alarm and fear among the general public and encourages vulnerable youths to join terrorist organisation including Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) /Daesh and Al-Qaida, and also conspired to establish Islamic rule in India by committing terrorist acts as part of violent jihad.”
“The case involves key players of the society and they are highly influential even to the effect of stalling the community and its progress by a mere call. The common man stands threatened by the stand taken by the accused and their henchmen… If they are enlarged on bail, they will definitely go underground and their presence cannot be secured for elective investigation of this case and for subsequent trial,” read the remand report filed in a special NIA court in Ernakulam in Kerala.
In ED’s remand report, it claimed that“more than 120 crore have been deposited in the accounts of PFI and related entities over the years and that a very large part of the same has been deposited in cash.”
According to ED, this money was used for Delhi violence 2020 and Hathras protest and to “organise a training camp with the intent to cause disturbance during the Prime Minister’s Patna visit on July 12, 2022.”
ED further claimed that PFI and its associate organisations were collecting funds from several Gulf countries in a “structured manner.”
Popular Front of India, one of the prominent Muslim groups in India, has consistently denied these allegations, and called the action as a “witch-hunt” against Muslim movement and democratic forces.