‘Irfan helped IM to expand ops in Nepal’

Irfan Ahmad, alias Pappu, was lodged in Tihar jail between 1996 and 1999. During this time period he befriended Aasif Reza Khan who was booked in another TADA case and was later encountered by the police in Gujarat. While in Tihar, Aasif told Irfan that it was time to sow the seeds of a new movement through Indian Mujahideen (IM) and that Irfan should somehow escape and meet him in Kolkata.

“On June 19, 2001, Irfan managed to procure a parole for four days on the pretext of his younger brother’s marriage. Irfan, in this span of his parole, escaped to Kolkata and met Aasif who introduced him to his younger brother Aamir Reza Khan. Both Aamir and Aasif started training Irfan on how to communicate through e-mails,” said S N Shrivastava, Special Commissioner of Police (Special Cell).

He was then sent off to Nepal where he covered himself up as a jacket manufacturer and opened a cyber cafe. Aamir and Aasif used to send money to Irfan to run his family. To raise funds for IM, Irfan also ran extortion and abduction rackets in India, mainly in Bihar. His job was, however, to send the new recruits of IM to Pakistan for training and receive the ones who were through with their trainings in Pakistan.

With time, the need for trusted manpower grew and Irfan introduced his son Issa who was given the task of safe transportation of terrorists received in Kathmandu to their varying destinations in India.

It is important to mention that in 2005, Irfan’s 15 associates faced trail before a CBI court and were convicted under TADA and sentenced to life imprisonment.