The Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) of Uttar Pradesh police investigating religious conversion scam by Islamic scholar Maulana Kaleem Siddiqui and others have claimed to have detected the flow of foreign funds worth Rs 150 crore for the racket. While the investigation is underway, the above fund detected so far was invested in the illegal religious conversion activities in India. The fund mainly originated from Gulf countries Bahrain, Britain, Turkey and others.
The ATS has partially disclosed foreign funding in a charge sheet submitted before the court of the chief judicial magistrate of Lucknow against Rameshwar Kawade, Kausal Alam, Bhupriyo Bando alias Arslan and Faraz Shah of Maharashtra. They are among 10 accused arrested by ATS for carrying illegal conversion to Islam in Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka and other parts of the country. ATS alleged accused were working in a syndicate for a systematic conversion to alter the demographic structure and to create communal ill-will.
According to a report, the fund was sent to Kaleem Siddiqui, Maulana Umar Gautam and Salahuddin Zainuddin Sheikh. All three were arrested by ATS during the course of the investigation. Now the ATS is investigating background of organizations that provided funds to them.
Three organizations namely Islamic Dawah Centre, Fatima Charitable Trust and Al Hasan Educational & Welfare Foundation being run by Umar Gautam were used as fronts to receive foreign funds. In the last five years, Umar Gautam is accused to have received Rs 57 crore as foreign funds, out of which 60 per cent was used to run the conversion racket. Most of the fund was transferred by Britain based Britain-based Al Falah Trust. ATS said Kawade’s wife Maihasan Ali who is an Egyptian is a key foreign link of Umar Gautam.
The maulana who suffixes the Hindu name Gautam is himself a curious case of conversion. Born in 1964 a Rajpoot family in Fatehpur, he converted to Islam under influence of his Muslim friends while pursuing higher studies in agriculture science in Nainital in 1984. The trickiest and quick among the trio, in the last year he had converted around 1000 people, according to the ATS. He always targeted vulnerable people for conversion, told them his own story of a Thakur converting to Mohammedan as he hated caste-based discrimination of Hindu society.
Salahuddin Zainuddin Sheikh is a native of Vadodara who runs the American Federation of Muslim of Indian Origin. He had received Rs 28 crore in the last five years which he gave to Umar Gautam. Maulana Kaleem who runs many organizations like Jamia Imam Waliullah Trust has received huge foreign funds for religious conversion.
Notably, the Enforcement Directorate is also investigating them for alleged money laundering.
