Kolkata: Jailed ISIS suspect hit prison official with stone, slashes his throat

Kolkata: Arrested ISIS suspect Mohammed Masihuddin alias Musa, who had allegedly planned to target foreign nationals at Mother House, the Missionaries of Charity headquarters in Kolkata, allegedly tried to kill a prison official at Alipore Central Jail on Sunday morning.

The injured – Gokul Chandra Dey – is a jail warder in his fifties.

The incident took place when Dey went to take Musa out of his cell as part of 'Lock Out,' a routine session that allows the prisoners to go out in a compound on the prison premises after the day starts, said director general of police (correctional services) Arun Kumar Gupta.

"As the jail warder asked Musa to come out around 8 am, Musa started making Jehadi comments towards his fellow prisoners. As the jail warder intervened, he pushed him off to the ground and hit him with a piece of stone. He slashed his throat with a small but sharp iron rod used in PWD works in prison," Gupta said.

Dey was rescued by his colleagues and was rushed to SSKM Hospital from where he was later shifted to Calcutta Medical Research Institute.

"His condition is stable now. A case under section 307 (attempt to murder) of the Indian Penal Code has been initiated against Musa. An investigation is underway," Gupta said.

Dey has been posted on the job for the past two years, according to sources.

Originally from Labhpur in Birbhum, the 25-year-old terror suspect was arrested by the criminal investigation department from the Burdwan railway station in July 2016 on charges of radicalising youths to join ISIS. He also reportedly had links to Jamaat-Ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), whose leader Abu Suleiman had met Musa at the latter’s sister’s wedding in March 2015.

Later, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) took him in its custody to unearth ISIS network and its plots in the state. Musa was questioned by the Rapid Action Batallion of Bangladesh and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Musa has been lodged at the high security prison for over a year now.

In December last year, the NIA in a chargesheet accused Musa of plotting an attack on the Mother House to kill the American, British and Russian citizens – who visit the place on AJC Bose Road in south Kolkata to pay homage to its founder, Mother Teresa. The attack was planned to retaliate to the offensive against ISIS in the Middle East.

Musa came under the scanner of Indian security agencies after his e-mails and calls were traced to Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Syria. According to the NIA, he had been in touch with several ISIS operatives, including leader Shafi Arman, in Syria through Facebook and Twitter. He was entrusted with building an ISIS module and recruitment base in West Bengal.