The al-Qaeda and the Indian Mujahideen are plotting to launch joint terror attacks in India, intelligence officials have warned, revealing that the two outfits want to turn India into "Syria and Iraq, where violence is continuously happening."
Officials who deciphered communication between the two groups have found that the IM militants are now training under al-Qaeda, along with other groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan, to launch terror attacks in the country, Reuters reported.
The revelations comes two months after al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri had launched it Indian wing, warning of attacks in several states in the country, including Gujarat and Jammu & Kashmir.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who faces personal threat from terror groups in Pakistan, has been briefed about potential threat from transnational terror groups, The Indian Express had reported.
Among one of the plots of the two groups is to kidnap foreigners and Jews in India, officials revealed. They stated that the Wagah border suicide bombing and the terror threats in Kolkata's ports were evidence of increasing terror activities in the country.
"The thing we are looking for is how al-Qaeda/ISIS tie up with local groups, especially as the drawdown takes place in Afghanistan," Sharad Kumar, head of the National Investigation Agency, told Reuters.
According to the online chats of the Indian Mujahideen, intelligence officials have discovered that the group's ties with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency is souring, and that it was "itching for independent action."
A conversation of IM co-founder Riaz Bhatkal has revealed him telling members that it is important to build direct ties with al-Qaeda, and even hinted at visiting al-Qaeda leaders along the Afghan-Pak border.
In fact, officials also claimed that al-Qaeda had also directed IM members to open a base in Myanmar to avenge attacks on Rohingya Muslims.
The Indian government has already chargesheeted 11 IM members for plotting to attack India, and the report also states that some members of the outfit are already fighting alongside al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.
