PFI story an epitome of self-radicalisation

Hyderabad: Back in the late 1970s and 1980s, when Muhammed Ahmedullah Siddiqui, the founder of Students Islamic Movement of India (Simi), used to give highly motivated speeches to restore the supremacy of Islam in India, it used to have a lasting effect on all those listening to him in rapt attention. So much so, that the followers would be ready to go to any extent to fulfill the aim of their organisation.

Years later, firebrand Simi leaders like Dr Shahid Badr Falahi and Safdar Nagori continued this trend of delivering high voltage speeches to take more and more youth into their fold until the Centre banned Simi in 2001.

But, for the Popular Front of India (PFI) — believed to be an off-shoot of the proscribed Simi, something the outfit vehemently denies — it is more of self-radicalisation that has driven their members to fearlessly indulge in a series of heinous offences ranging from political murders, hate campaigns, alleged forced conversions, possession of arms to murderous attacks among others.

Now, on the radar of the Centre for its alleged involvement in the violent protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), especially in Uttar Pradesh and Manguluru of Karnataka, most of the members who joined the PFI in the last several years were reportedly self-radicalised which makes it much easier for the organisation often linked to various Pakistan-based terror groups.

PFI watchers told Deccan Chronicle that after its inception in 2006, the organisation initially had quite a few “motivational” speakers, some of whom had previously held posts in Simi. However, over the years, with the PFI, making the most of social media platforms and with a lot of online content available, the new members came “all prepared.”

“When it comes to PFI, most of its members are self-radicalised and this is the sole reason why one finds them fearlessly indulging in a series of serious offences over the last many years. Propaganda material beginning from the Babri masjid demolition to the alleged atrocities on the community, Gujarat riots to the events across the world has resulted in many self-radicalised youths joining the group or at least sympathising with them,” they said.

Pointing on how self-radicalisation was evident in various offences allegedly committed by the outfit, right from the time the PFI members reportedly chopped off the hands of a Kerala professor to ‘love Jihad’, where they are claimed to have forcibly converted women, political murders and their members allegedly joining the Islamic State, sources said that self-radicalisation, which is now an international phenomena, is bound to have disastrous consequences.

“Each person who is self-radicalised has the potential to inflict harm on others single-handedly. If a group of such individuals joins hands, it will have disastrous consequences and the same can be said about PFI,” they said.

Sources said that the PFI members were allegedly involved behind every criminal act in the last decade and that self-motivated individuals are alleged to have played a key role in executing them.

For instance, in the chopping off the hand of the Kerala professor in 2010, there were two failed attempts and the accused, who were just not willing to give up, could strike in their third attempt. Immediately afterwards, one of the attackers told him, “this hand which insults Islam will not be raised in future.”

“In the other offences they are involved in, the determination and planning with which they have executed their operations indicates that most of them are self-motivated. In some offences, planning and strategies were discussed for months before they were finally executed.

We have not come across any case where they backtracked or thought twice about the consequences,” an official who has interrogated PFI members, disclosed.