Cops to school kids on ISIS’s true face

Amid recent reports of many youngsters in the city getting enamoured of the Islamic State, a banned terror outfit, the Mumbai police plans to hold seminars and talks with students. Sources said that the police is currently concentrating on various educational institutes as part of its measures to prevent the youth from falling for the Islamic State’s wiles.

Top Mumbai police officers said the issue was being looked at seriously. “It is important to create awareness and educate youngsters regarding the Islamic State and its real face. In this age, it is very easy to get information regarding them, so we need to reach out and talk to youngsters openly,” said a senior police official.

“We are in the process of drawing up a list of the colleges and once that is done we will talk to the college authorities and see what can be done,” he added.

Sources said these endeavours would involve one-on-one interactions with students as well as plays, seminars and talks by experts. “Children get all their information from the social media and there are many websites that display content in support of the Islamic State. While our teams are always monitoring the Internet and even the dark net, where many such things are rampant, we need measures to prevent youngsters from getting lured by supporters,” said an officer.

He added that they would be talking to various organisations to plan activities. “It is important to involve the community and speak to parents and family members so that Internet activities and what the youngsters do on their phones can be monitored,” he said.

Recent recruitments May 2014 Aman Tandel, Areeb Majeed, Saheem Tanki and Fahad Shaikh, residents of Kalyan, leave home to allegedly join the Islamic State in Syria November 2014 While Areeb returns and is nabbed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), Aman and Fahad are said to have died in a suicide bombing October 2015 A Malwani youth, Ayaz Sultan (23), goes missing after telling his parents he is going for an interview. Sources say he went to Syria and joined the Islamic State December 2015 Three youngsters from Malwani, Wajid Shaikh, Mohsin Sayyed and Noor Mohammad, disappear and are said to have joined the Islamic State, but they are traced to Pune and return home January 2016 Abdul Sheikh, a Mumbra resident, is arrested by the NIA for being an ISIS sympathiser