KOLKATA/HOWRAH: If the central agencies are to be believed then West Bengal might be one of the most prominent states which Islamic State (IS) are targeting as their potential ground for recruitment of young people. They have not only opened the cyber route to encourage youths to join this banned terror outfit but they have made their physical presence in some of the bordering districts of West Bengal.

The ministry of home affairs has also warned the state government several times and union minister Rajnath Singh has mentioned that West Bengal is a potential threat for terror activities. However, the government is yet to open a cyber-cell for monitoring the terror activities in the state.

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In a meeting in the first week of August with DGPs of twelve states where West Bengal police chief G M P Reddy was also present, former union home secretary L C Goyal pointed out that Howrah has been one of the places from where curious youngsters have been closely following the activities of Islamic State and their outreach on social media.

The Ministry then asked the state government to form a team of cyber experts and they will be trained at National Technical and Research Organisation (NTRO), Bengaluru, so that they can monitor the social networking sites.

Even after four months, the state government has failed to form a team. When asked about it, a top officer in the state police said, “There are some activities going on in the state and we are trying to track them in our own way and through the existing mechanism, but we cannot afford to form a dedicated cyber team at this moment. We have a serious shortage of manpower and unless this problem is managed we cannot afford to spare efficient officers only for monitoring social networking sites.”

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West Bengal popped up on the terror map after the cyber cell of the Intelligence Bureau conducted a national survey to mark the areas from where the IS are trying to recruit youths. According to the survey Howrah is the fourth city after Srinagar, Guwahati and Chinchwad (a suburb of Pune) where youths between 16 to 30 have shown online interest in IS. Not only did the IS make their speech available in Bengali but in the last two months there has been a huge recovery of IS posters from the bordering villages in Nadia and Murshidabad.

Though the district police are tight-lipped about the recovery, according to a report by the central agencies, 147 posters have been recovered from 17 villages, of which 11 are in Murshidabad and six are in Nadia. The posters say Mughalistan (or Mughalstan) is the name of an independent homeland proposed for the Muslims of India.

Knowing well that the Jamaat ul Mujahideen Bangladesh activists have already made headway in the state, which will have prepared smooth access to the IS militants, the state police have been sitting idle over this development and have made no arrest so far.