Between 2012 and 2014, Mehdi Masroor Biswas used the social media platform Twitter to become one of the most influential online recruiters in India for the terrorist organisation Islamic State (ISIS). He was known by the Twitter handle “@ShamiWitness.” He used his social media skills to propagate ISIS ideology. He was arrested in 2014 for operating a pro-ISIS account on Twitter (now X). His account played a vital role in radicalising and recruiting youth to join ISIS. His sentence is ending in December 2024, and he would be free to walk among those whom he had incited violence against via his Twitter handle.
Who is Mehdi Masroor Biswas
For those who knew Mehdi Masroor Biswas, he was an unassuming engineer working in Bengaluru. However, he was living a double life as a prominent ISIS propagandist, which was later revealed during the investigation into the Twitter handle ShamiWitness. Under the said pseudonym, Mehdi propagated ISIS ideology and glorified jihadist violence. He also encouraged Islamists from the West to join the ranks of the Islamic State. At his peak, the ShamiWitness handle became a key English-language resource for ISIS. The account provided real-time updates of the battlefield victories of the terrorist group. He used to translate the information released in the Arabic language and post it on social media. Furthermore, he offered direct support to ISIS terrorists and sympathisers.
By the time he was arrested, Mehdi had 17,700 followers on Twitter, including several jihadists from the West. His tweets included incitements against various groups, specifically against Hindus, whom he referred to in derogatory terms. Speaking to Channel 4, he specifically said, “Beheadings are discussed in Quran and Hadith itself. I don’t think any honest Muslim will ever tell you he is against beheadings per se.” The radical content posted by him served as a recruitment tool for the terrorist organisation ISIS. With time, he became an influential figure within ISIS’s online ecosystem despite never physically joining them in Syria and Iraq.
Arrest and Conviction
On 11th December 2014, Channel 4 News published its investigation exposing ShamiWitness handle’s identity. Soon after, Bengaluru police arrested him and charged Mehdi with offences under the Indian Penal Code and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. Following his arrest, then-Karnataka DGP L Panchau told reporters that he had confessed he was handing the social media account. Furthermore, the police said that he was particularly close to IS terrorists who were fluent in English.
Mehdi was working as a manufacturing engineer in a multinational company. He was earning a decent income of Rs 5.3 lakh per annum. Despite having a decent career, he was drawn to ISIS ideology and used his online skills to spread jihadist propaganda on social media. Interestingly, two-thirds of Mehdi’s followers, who was originally from West Bengal, were not from India. These accounts were being operated by terrorists fighting for the IS in Iraq and Syria. The police used his mobile phone location to track him to his house.
Pachau told the media that Mehdi was particularly interested in the Levantine region, which consisted of Cyprus, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and parts of Southern Turkey from 2003 onward.
CCB ON TOP: ISIS Tweeter ideologue Mehdi Masroor Biswas, 24, Engineer arrested at Bengaluru by Crime Branch (CCB)! pic.twitter.com/c8hspLtuvS
— Hemant Nimbalkar IPS (@IPSHemant) December 13, 2014
When Mehdi was arrested, he was only 24 years old. He used to post on Twitter during office hours. Police Commissioner MN Reddi said, “He was particularly close to the English-speaking terrorists of ISIS and became a source of incitement and information for the new recruits trying to join ISIS/ISIL.” He added, “The effect of what he was doing, the impact of what he was doing was really not about India, nor was he provoking or promoting people within India to align or sympathize with ISIS. It was more about how he could manage to anglicize the conversations of ISIS and that led to a huge impact from what I can understand in the European world, particularly in the UK. Therefore the interest was very high in the UK to track and trace him and he incidentally happened to be in Bangalore.”
Channel 4 also talked to Mehdi before publishing a report on his social media handle. Speaking to the channel, he said that he would have gone to join ISIS himself but did not go due to financial constraints faced by his family. He said, “If I had a chance to leave everything and join them I might have… my family needs me here.” Mehdi’s full identity was not revealed by Channel 4 and he was referred to as “Mehdi” only. Channel 4 specifically mentioned that Mehdi told them if his identity got revealed, his life would be in danger.
MK Thammaiah, the then-assistant commissioner of police (CCB) and investigating officer, stated that Biswas’ retrieved tweets and retweets played a critical part in his conviction. “In all, he had made 1,22,208 tweets and most of them were related to IS activities. Along with the tweets, he had posted (deleted later and retrieved during the investigation) 15,500 images,” Thammaiah said, adding that at first, Biswas supported the Jama’at Nusrat Al-Islam Wal Muslimin (JNIM). “When IS gained popularity, Biswas started supporting it and urged JNIM leaders to join forces with IS. He was in touch with 88 men who were identified as terror suspects from Syria and other countries,” he added.
Mehdi Biswas was also accused of predicting on Twitter the beheadings of US journalist James Foley and UK aid worker Peter Kassig just weeks before the Islamic State executed them. He was also accused of advocating for IS support in Kashmir, tweeting that the terrorists in Kashmir were martyrs.
Though his arrest was seen as a significant victory in the fight against radicalisation via online channels, it opened new doors for investigators to identify and scrutinise pro-Jihadi accounts on social media. As his case unfolded, a highly sophisticated and covert nature of his propaganda efforts was revealed.
IS’s campaign to free Mehdi
Soon after his arrest, it was revealed that officials of the Islamic State (IS) started a “Free Shami Witness” campaign. One of the IS Twitter handles, IS_WorldPress, said in a post, “Bengaluru ruthless police arrest brother Mehdi Masroor Biswas as owner of @ShamiWitness Twitter account.” Another tweet read, “He isn’t a poor guy… he is a truthful media hero (and) a freedom of rights analyst.”
In fact, support for him poured in from India as well. ORF Online fellow and columnist Mihir Sharma wrote in one of his posts, “I’m sure Mehdi Biswas’ pro-ISIS opinions are repugnant, but does anyone know what crime he has been arrested for? Just speech?”
Propagandist Kavita Krishnan, without taking Mehdi’s name, wrote, “So we can prosecute an indiv for hate tweets? But not Ministers for hate-speech, or actual violent hate-crimes like 1984, 1992 #Dec6, 2002?”
While many of those who were against his arrest demanded his release, several accounts pointed out the wrongs he had done. One of the X users, Rukmini Callimachi, shared screenshots of his posts where he had a Twitter exchange in which he appeared to have told jihadis in Türkiye which border crossings were open so that they could reach the IS stronghold of Raqqa in Syria.
For those wondering is #ShamiWitness played a role in recruitment to IS, this exchange suggests he gave advice pic.twitter.com/bqxInlEBzu
— Rukmini Callimachi (@rcallimachi) December 12, 2014
Notably, the Central Crime Branch police filed a 36,986-page chargesheet against Biswas in June 2015. Although he was never physically associated with the Islamic State, Biswas acquired information about the terrorist organisation by spending hours compiling data on radical Islamic activity in the Middle East and disseminating it via the @shamiwitness handle.
During the trial, Mehdi’s counsel claimed that he did not wage any war or participated directly in any terror activities. However, the court in its judment did not accept the argument as his actions were a serious threat to national security. The court said, “he tweeted and retweeted thousands and thousands times supporting all the activities of deadly terrorist organisation ISIS/ISIL, waged war against the Governments of Syria and Iraq which is Asiatic Power in alliance and at peace with the Government of India, recruited the persons to the terrorist organisation and invited the support and encouraged the Muslims to further the activities of the deadly terrorist organisation.” Mehdi was sentenced on multiple charges. The maximum sentence was of 10 years in prison, including the time he spent in jail during the trial.
He was convicted and sentenced in January 2024. As his time in jail was marked as time served, Mehdi Masroor Biswas will come out of jail in December 2024 as he has been behind bars since his arrest in December 2014.
