File Photo of Hizbul Mujahideen chief and US-designated terrorist Syed Salahuddin.

NEW DELHI: The National Investigation Agency on Thursday arrested the son of Hizbul Mujahideen chief and US-designated terrorist Syed Salahuddin in connection with its probe into the 2011 terror funding case accusing him of having received money from his father for subversive activities in India.

NIA in joint raids with CRPF and J&K police in Srinagar’s Rambagh area, picked up 48-year-old Syed Ahmad Shakeel, a senior laboratory assistant at Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Science. His younger brother, Syed Shahid Yousuf , was arrested by NIA in October 2017 in the same case.

Shakeel, NIA said, had received money through Western Union several times, sent by absconding Aijaz Ahmad Bhat alias Aijaz Maqbool Bhat .

However Shakeel’s family has defended him. “Syed Shakeel is working at SKIMS as lab technologist for last 30 years, whose record of peaceful behavior and attitude could be verified from the concerned authorities. The allegations by NIA against Syed Shakeel are totally baseless.”

The probe showed Shakeel, eldest son of Syed Salahuddin, self-styled chief of Hizbul-Mujahideen terror group, had received funds from operatives of HM in different parts of the world, NIA said in a statement.

The agency had earlier summoned him for questioning, but he didn’t appear before it prompting the agency to secure a non-bailable warrant against him.

He has been brought to Delhi and will be produced before a Special NIA court on Friday.

The agency had registered a case in April 2011 to probe transfer of money from Pakistan to Jammu and Kashmir through hawala channels via Delhi, which the agency believed was used in funding terrorism and secessionist activities.

