Chhattisgarh Police arrest terror funding accused on run since 2013

The Chhattisgarh Police have arrested from Jharkhand a 41-year-old man allegedly involved in a terror funding case and absconding since 2013, an official said.

Shravan Kumar Mandal (41), a native of Bihar, was arrested by a joint team of the Chhattisgarh Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS), Raipur police's Anti Crime and Cyber Unit and police from Deoghar district of Jharkhand, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Prashant Agrawal said on Tuesday.

Mandal was on the run since 2013 when the case was registered at Raipur's Khamtarai police station, he said.

"He had allegedly transferred several lakhs of rupees through his bank account to the accounts of people linked with terrorist organisations Students' Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and Indian Mujahideen, the official said.

In 2013, the Chhattisgarh ATS arrested Dheeraj Sao who ran a roadside eatery in Transport Nagar area here for allegedly receiving funds from a Pakistani national called Khalid and transferring it to people linked with the Indian Mujahideen and SIMI through his bank account, Agrawal said.

The money went to Raju Khan, Jubair Husain and his wife Ayesha Bano, he said. All of them were subsequently arrested.

A court in Raipur recently convicted Dheeraj Sao, Pappu Mandal, both natives of Bihar, and Jubair Husain and Ayesha Bano of Karnataka in the case and sentenced them to 10 years in jail, the police official said.