Mumbai: 'Juvenile' ISIS suspect's stay at remand home extended

A magistrate's court on Thursday extended till February 16 the stay of a 'juvenile', arrested by the Maharashtra ATS for allegedly recruiting youngsters in Mumbai for ISIS, in the children's remand home as the court could not immediately authenticate the documents in support of his age.

While the defence lawyer argued that the terror suspect is 16 years and 8 months old, the ATS contested the claim saying he is 20-year-old. Both the sides today produced various documents to support their claims on his age but they mentioned different dates of birth, according to an official.

The magistrate then sought more time to examine the authenticity of the documents and extended the accused's remand till February 16. The court had sent him to children's remand home on January 3 owing to the dispute over his exact age.

The accused was allegedly second-in-command of ISIS in India and was assigned the task of recruiting youths. He was arrested from Kushinagar of Uttar Pradesh last month.

ATS suspects that he radicalised and guided Ayaz Sultan, a former BPO employee and a resident of Malwani here, who had left the country last month, reportedly to join ISIS. Ayaz and three other youths, all from Malwani, reportedly left home to join ISIS after being radicalised by the accused. However, two of them, identified as Noor Mohamad and Wajid Shaikh, returned in last week of December.