Kolkata: Intelligence agencies, bot central and state, including the members of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) team, probing the incident regarding the harassment of the judicial adjudication officers at Kaliachak in Malda district of West Bengal are trying to track the overseas links of the arrested mastermind in the case, Mofakkarul Islam, and his close aide and YouTuber Akramul Bagani, sources said on Saturday.
Both Islam and Bagani were arrested at Bagdogra Airport by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officers of the West Bengal Police on Friday while they were trying to escape from the state.
Sources said that since the arrest of Islam and Bagani on Friday morning, social media had been flooded with posts expressing solidarity towards them, many of which are from abroad, which had prompted the Intelligence agencies to track the overseas links and activities of the two accused, especially Islam.
The social media accounts of certain fellow YouTubers and Bagani’s social media influencers, who have also shared solidarity posts against the arrests, are also under the scanner of Intelligence agencies.
Meanwhile, the members of the NIA probe team have already collected the CCTV footage relating to the event of seven judicial officers, including three women, being held hostage at Kaliachak on Wednesday night from the local Mothabari Police station, and the investigating officials are currently examining that footage.
They are especially examining the video footage where Islam was seen and heard standing on the roof of a vehicle and giving highly provocative messages to the assembled crowd protesting against the alleged deletion of their names from the voters’ list in the course of judicial adjudication.
The members of the NIA team have also collected CCTV footage of the road blockades at various places in Kaliachak on the same day.
Earlier this week, a division bench of the Supreme Court led by the Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to hand over the charge of investigation in the matter of harassment of judicial adjudication officers either to the NIA or to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
Later, the ECI opted to hand over the probe to NIA regarding the matter.
(IANS)
