NIA arrests PFI's state secretary CA Rauf in Kerala

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) said on Friday that it arrested the former secretary of the Popular Front of India (PFI) in Kerala, CA Rauf, from his house in the Palakkad district of the state.

Rauf, who has been absconding for several months, was arrested on Thursday night. He was under the radar of the Kerala Police as well as the NIA. The central agency had intensified its efforts to arrest him after the government last month declared the PFI an unlawful organisation and banned it for five years.

In September, more than 100 PFI workers were arrested in multiple raids carried out across the country by the NIA, the Enforcement Directorate and state agencies, based on findings about a number of instances of international linkages of PFI with global terrorist groups like the ISIS. Some PFI cadres are found to have joined international terrorist organisations.


The PFI and its associates are also charged for working covertly to increase the radicalisation of one community by promoting a sense of insecurity in the country.

(with agency inputs)