Keralite youth, who joined ISIS killed in US drone attack in Afghanistan
Malappuram, July 31: A Kerala youth, suspected to have fled to Afghanistan in 2017 to join the Islamic State (IS), was killed in a US drone strike in that country, according to information received by his relatives here.
A WhatsApp message received by the family of Muhammed Muhasin on Tuesday said that the youth, a resident of Edappal, had become a "Shaheed" (martyr) 10 days ago.
Confirming the message received by the family, police told PTI that the message had been forwarded to them by the relatives and investigations have begun.
In 2017, while he was a final year student in an Engineering college in Thrissur, Muhasin had left home saying he was going to Bengaluru.
Police, acting on a missing complaint from his relatives, had registered a case, conducted a probe and found that he had left for Dubai.
The Intelligence Bureau had also probed his disappearance.
According to the relatives, the IB had visted them and informed them that Muhasin had joined the Islamic State (IS).
With the report of his death coming in, police in Malappuram once again began the probe.
Two years ago, a missing man from Kasaragod in Kerala, who was suspected to have joined Islamic State, was killed in a drone strike in Afghanistan.
Murshid Muhammed, a native of Padna in Kerala's Kasaragod district, was killed in a drone attack in Nangarhar province in Afghanistan.
He was among the 21 people from the state, who reportedly went missing after travelling to the Middle East and were suspected to have joined the IS in Syria.
Earlier, another man T K Hafeesudeen, 24, also from Padna, was killed in a drone attack in Afghanistan.
Kerala man, who joined ISIS, dies in US drone strike in Afghanistan
— ANI Digital (@ani_digital) July 31, 2019
Read @ANI story | https://t.co/vxpO0kynPQ pic.twitter.com/osaNywKu6x
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Confident we are going to win Kerala: Shashi Tharoor
New Delhi (PTI): Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday expressed confidence in the victory of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in Kerala, saying the Congress-led alliance will win more than 75 seats out of the total 140 in the state.
Tharoor, who hails from Kerala, said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls, most of which predicted a victory for the UDF that has been out of power for 10 years in the state.
"We have been on the ground. I have campaigned in 59 constituencies across 12 districts out of 14. I was very confident we are going to win.
"Everything that I have picked up from not just my party colleagues and workers but also from other observers, media and others have always convinced me that we were going to score a comfortable win of above 75 seats. And all the (exit) polls have confirmed the same thing," he told reporters here.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls but in general he was not a big fan of exit polls in India.
"Because ours is not purely a homogenous society. We have to take into account gender issue, caste issue, class issue, regional disparities. You never get a convincingly large enough sample to give an accurate poll and now there is the additional complication that we have heard about in West Bengal this year that many people are unwilling to answer the questions of the pollsters," he said.
The Congress leader said normally, it used to be below 10 per cent that people said that they would not answer.
"Even if you are a reputable exit pollster, in Bengal, one polling company has said 60 per cent of people refused to answer. So, what is the worth of a poll where 60 per cent of your respondents have not answered," he said.
Several exit polls on Wednesday predicted a comeback by the Congress-led UDF in Kerala after 10 years, dethroning the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF).
Polling for the 140-member Kerala assembly was held on April 9. Results of assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Puducherry, besides Kerala, will be announced on May 4.
