National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Saturday conducted searches at 15 different locations in several districts of Jammu and Kashmir in connection with the banned Jamaat-e-Islami terror funding and militant conspiracy case, officials said.
They said NIA sleuths with help of J&K Police and Central Reserve Police Force conducted searches in seven districts in the union territory.
The spokesperson of NIA said extensive searches were conducted in Srinagar, Budgam, Pulwama, Shopian, Awantipora, Anantnag, Handwara, Kupwara and Poonch districts relating to members of the banned JeI and overground workers involved in conspiracies hatched by proscribed militant organisations and their affiliates.
The NIA said the searches also focused on the J&K Terror Funding Case, registered suo moto by the agency on February 5, 2021.
A large number of incriminating documents and digital devices have been seized during these searches and are being scrutinized to track further links of the suspects, the NIA said.
The raids , the NIA said, are part of Agency efforts to dismantle the terror support systems in Jammu and Kashmir.
The terror funding case pertains to the collection of funds by JeI (J&K) ostensibly for charitable purposes but has been using them instead for promotion of terror activities by proscribed terrorist organisations, such as Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM) and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
NIA had earlier chargesheeted four persons in the case, involving well-organised cadres of the terrorist outfits operating in J&K.
The NIA had, June 21, 2022, registered another case against the various banned terrorist organisations and their newly floated affiliates.
The case related to the conspiracies being hatched physically and in cyberspace by these outfits for carrying out violent terrorist attacks in J&K with sticky bombs, IEDs and small arms.
The banned organisations and their affiliates have been engaged in conspiring to commit acts of terror and violence by radicalizing local youth and mobilizing overground workers with the aim of disrupting the peace and communal harmony of J&K.
The NIA has been moving swiftly to take action against some of the recently launched affiliates of the banned terrorist organisations, such as LeT, HUM, Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), Al-Badr, Al-Qaeda, etc.
Among the affiliates under NIA scrutiny are The Resistance Front (TRF), United Liberation Front Jammu & Kashmir (ULFJ&K), Mujahideen Gazwat-ul-Hind (MGH), Jammu & Kashmir Freedom Fighters (JKFF), Kashmir Tigers, PAAF.
NIA said the investigations so far have shown that cadres and workers of these outfits are involved in collection and distribution of sticky bombs/magnetic bombs, IEDs, funds, drugs and weapons & ammunition, as well as in spreading activities relating to terror, violence and subversion in J&K.