Three youths arrested from Nagpur stole money for flight, deleted Tab chats

Hyderabad: Three cousins, who were on their way to join terrorist organisations, were brought back to the city from Nagpur on Sunday. The three, Abdul Basith and Syed Omer Faruq Hussaini of Chandrayangutta, and Maaz Hussain of Mehdipatnam were arrested by a Special Investigation Team of Hyderabad police on Sunday afternoon under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

They will be produced in the Nampally criminal courts on Monday by SIT. Sources said that they stole Rs 90,000 from one of their own homes (Abdul Basith’s) to buy air tickets at Nagpur from a travel agent.

Central Crime Station joint commissioner of police T. Prabhakar Rao said, “The three missing complaints from Chandrayanagutta and Asifnagar police stations have been transferred to SIT. We have registered a case under UAPA. The accused were trying to join terror groups like ISIS.”

Police said that a tablet PC has been seized from the accused. “They deleted all the content they downloaded on the tablet. We have sent the tablet for cyber forensic examination to extract the data. The data can give us their exact plans,” said an investigating official. Police are also analysing the mobile phone call data of the three.

SIT teams also searched the residences of the accused in Chandrayanagutta and Mehdipatnam. Investigations have revealed that the accused hatched a plan in Nalgonda when they met for a dawat, to run away and join a terror outfit. One of them also had a girlfriend and cops are verifying her antecedents.