Abdul Rizwan, alias Hajili of Daryagunj, New Delhi, accused of being a member of the Islamic State (IS) module of Pune, is believed to have conducted a meeting on carrying out a sabotage operations with modules of other states at his hideout in New Malakpet here, before his eventual arrest. It is reported that Rizwan, who was picked up by Delhi ATS and a special cell dealing with terrorists, had a stronghold with recruits from the city, who provided him shelter using a fake ID during his stay here. A special team from NIA, who, on August 11, took Rizwan into custody from Delhi ATS, had on September 20 conducted search operations at his hideout in an apartment in Kalyannagar, New Malakpet, and in six other apartments in which occupants were reportedly from neighbouring countries and were in constant touch with Rizwan.
NIA officials maintained that as it was an issue concerning national security, names of the ISIS suspects would not be revealed. Rizwan with a reward of Rs 3 lakh on his head managed to get Aadhaar and SIM cards and a handset. Many people visited Rizwan's house, though only a few looked like locals, one of his neighbours said.
“We knew him as Abdul and he hardly interacted with anyone. We heard him speak on the phone in Hindi, Marathi and fluent Arabic. We presumed that he was from the Middle East.
Only later we learnt that Rizwan belonged to IS. It is nightmarish to think that we were living next to a terrorist for several months”, he said..