The National Investigation Agency said on Sunday that the Islamic State had planned to attack Missionaries of Charity office in Kolkata when the house would be cramped with lot of foreign Christian visitors.
In a chargheesheet submitted to a sessions court in Kolkata, the NIA said the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh leader and IS sympathiser Musa, who had been recently arrested from a hideout in West Bengal, revealed that the IS leadership in the Middle East had approved such a plan.
“Accordingly, we planned the attack at Missionaries of Charity office in Kolkata. We were also giving tasks to leaders to carry out the operation. But we were waiting for right time when a lot of foreign visitors would be attending the big office in Kolkata,” Musa was quoted as saying by an NIA officer.
Musa was one of the kingpins in Khargargh blast in October 2014, which had exposed the terror module of newly emerging JMB groups of Bangladesh in West Bengal. Though more than 20 terrorists have been arrested so far in connection with the terror rackets of JMB, several senior leaders have yet to be nabbed.
JMB is known to be the nodal group of the IS in Bangladesh and eastern India including West Bengal, Bihar and northeastern states like Assam.
After Musa's revelations, West Bengal government is considering putting a security ring around the Mother House, the headquarters of the Missionaries of Charity, on Kolkata’s AJC Bose road. Although there is a police deployment near the house, Charity’s buildings are largely vulnerable to attacks. The house is open to anybody during the working hour.
The Missionaries of Charity has not yet responded to the latest developments.
It would be, according to insiders, unlikely that MC would accept intense security inside the house as it would contradict the “philosophy of Mother Teresa”.
“However, a security ring outside, would be welcomed,” said a priest close to charity house.
